Ari's In Wonderland: Review: “Ariel” Blotting Paper

When I was in Japan last year and I visited two of the Disney stores I could find in Tokyo, the one in Shibuya and the one in Shinjuku, I was expecting to pick up the usual things like cute accessories and phone cases. What I didn’t expect were beauty items! Yup, Japanese Disney stores now have lip gloss, face masks, point pads, blotting paper, and more. At the very least, I don’t recall ever seeing them the other time I was there four years ago. Combining Disney and beauty products meant I absolutely couldn’t resist grabbing a few things, and one of them is this Ariel blotting paper!

To be honest, before writing this review, I wasn’t sure what to call this item. I know it’s blotting paper, but it doesn’t have an official product name, if you get what I mean, on the packaging itself. But I checked the Japanese Disney store website and it’s labeled as “あぶらとり紙（ソープバブルスの香り）アリエル” which translates to “Blotting Paper (Soap Bubbles) – Ariel”. So, I decided “‘Ariel’ Blotting Paper” would be best.

Ariel has been my favorite Disney princess since I was a little girl, so of course this is the variant I chose! They have packs featuring other Disney characters too, like Minnie Mouse, Daisy Duck, and Chip & Dale. Each character’s pack has different scented blotting sheets. Ariel’s is of course soap bubbles! Appropriate, don’t you think? I bought the Minnie Mouse one for a friend and it had a strawberry scent to it.

Is this not the cutest and most glamorous looking blotting paper packaging? It even comes with a mirror! And yes, that is a 3D Ariel pop-up too. Japan never fails to amaze me with how they present their beauty products. I wish I could re-fill this with other blotting sheets once I run out so that I can use it over and over!

The blotting sheets themselves are semi-transparent and are 100 x 70MM in size, so they’re actually a little big. I like big blotting sheets though because it usually means you have to use less of them each time and I can get away with just using one of these whenever I need to get rid of any shine on my t-zone. I mentioned it’s scented and it really does smell like soap! The scent isn’t that strong unless you really take a whiff, but for those of you who are sensitive to fragrance still might not like this too much.

The sheets do a fairly good job at getting rid of shine. They’re just like a standard pack of blotting sheets, really, so what you’re mostly paying for is the gorgeous packaging. These are very affordable though, at least in Japan. For a more universal reference, they’re about $5. Over here it would be priced at almost PHP250.00, which is really expensive for blotting paper, especially since good ones are already less than PHP100.00. But where else can you find blotting paper this cute, right? For me, it’s just a fun and unique thing to have, especially if you’re a Disney fanatic like me.

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