No matter how you use them, you can count on these Studio Ghibli housewares to be comfortingly soft and achingly cute.

Taoruketto is a word that doesn’t show up so often in textbooks for people learning Japanese, so it can be a little tricky to decipher the first time you encounter it. The taoru part is just the Japanese pronunciation of “towel,” and ketto is back half of “blanket,” with an O tacked onto the end because Japanese words can’t end in consonants other than N. So while “towelket” might not be a word native English speakers would have made up on their own, it’s pretty easy to understand once you know what its linguistic components are, as a towelket is a kind of lightweight terrycloth blanket that’s popular during the less chilly parts of the year in Japan.

On the other end of the spectrum, it’s easy to instantly form a mental image when you hear the compound term “Catbus,” especially if you’re a Studio Ghibli anime fan. And now that you know what a towelket is too, yes, we can confirm that a Catbus towelket is every bit as adorable as it sounds.

Restocked at Ghibli specialty shop Donguri Kyowakoku just in time for the arrival of warm spring afternoons, the Catbus towelket is officially designated by the store as a “napket,” since it’s sized more as a compact throw blanket to use while dozing on the couch than something to wrap yourself up in when going to bed at night. At 120 by 87 centimeters (47.2 by 34.3 inches), the Catbus towelket is made of 100-percent cotton, soft to the touch and as comforting as your 20th rewatch of My Neighbor Totoro on a leisurely lazy Sunday. With the moisture-wicking quality of the fabric, Donguri Kyowakoku says that you can even use the Catbus towelket as a bath towel.

Speaking of everyone’s favorite forest spirit neighbor, Totoro has a towelket of his own too!

Decked out with illustrations of watermelons, Japanese festival water balloon yoyos, and, of course, corn, this one is perfect whether you’re winding down after some summer fun or grabbing some Zs to charge up for an outing later that day.

The Totoro towelket is the same size as the Catbus one, but the Kiki’s Delivery Service design is slightly more compact, at 115 by 85 centimeters. Still, there’s room enough for black cat Jiji and three of his kittens.

During the film’s ending credits sequence, we see that Jiji has become a daddy during his stay in the town where Kiki has set up her aerial courier enterprise, where he and a local named Lilly caught each other’s feline eyes. While there’s no shortage of merch featuring Jiji, it’s rare for his kids to be represented too, making this towelket a special treat for Kiki’s fans.

Finally, rounding off the Ghibli towelket lineup are two more My Neighbor Totoro designs with repeating patterns, one with Totoro…

…and the other with the Catbus, both, like the Jiji blanket, measuring 115 by 85 centimeters.

Prices start at 2,200 yen (US$14.75) for the Totoro summer and Jiji designs, with the Totoro and Catbus pattern blankets at 3,080 yen and the multi-leg Catbus towelket 4,180 yen. They’re all available through the Donguri Kyowakoku online store here.

Source: Donguri Kyowakoku
Top image: Donguri Kyowakoku
Insert images: Donguri Kyowakoku (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
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