Thursday 23 March 2017

I Had Never Really Thought About,

soap being black,


 until I saw this black welcome soap in the shape Tai, or sea bream in English, the fish has been caught and served in Japan for centuries, there are various theories why it’s considered to be a lucky fish like its bright red colour, or the fact that it lives a lot longer than typical fish, but the most commonly accepted theory is simply because of a pun: the word medetai (happy) ends in tai, Tamanohada is a 125-year old soap company that has occupied a factory space in Tokyo since their founding in 1892, they survived the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, and WW II,

 so they know a thing or two about making soap,
Tamanohada sources all the organic, raw ingredients for their soaps themselves so they’ve always had flexibility in the shapes and sizes of their soaps, but the actual inspiration for the tai welcome soap came from traditional wooden molds known as rakugan, or kashigata, Tai is a common motif and the company, somewhat on a whim, thought it would be fun to create soaps based on the symbol of good-luck, the Tamanohada Welcome Soaps are available in 3 scents: Red (Pomegranate), White (Lily Blossom) and Black (Brown sugar), and no I am not on commission, I had just never heard of black soap before!


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