The original Pure Neemo Advance D Type body, posed for sitting Japanese-style, but with no joints!

Lily has a penpal–Pidge, another Dollfie Dream Ms. Mariko. Pidge’s household originally sent my household some lovely presents for Valentine’s Day when I participated in a gift swap on the Dollfie Dreams forums. (You can view the photo story here!) Pidge didn’t yet live in that household when the Valentine’s Day event happened, but neither did Lily live in mine~ Still, Littlebearries‘ Alna was such a wonderful secret Valentine that I couldn’t help but feel excited to reciprocate for White Day. (You can view her side of the story here!)

From reading Alna’s blog entry about her receipt of the White Day present, I was reminded of the existence of a certain type of 1/6-scale dolls–Pure Neemo! ♥ This wasn’t the first time I knew of or have seen these adorable dolls made by Azone, but I hadn’t thought of them in a little while. At some point during my earlier Pullip-collecting days I was tipped off to Pure Neemo. If I recall correctly, it started off with my looking at Blythes and reading about Blythe restoration, which moved to the types of bodies that Blythe collectors and enthusiasts like to choose–and the Pure Neemo body was one of those options. It’s an interesting little 1/6 body–originally the body (called “Pure Neemo Advance”) was non-jointed, put together with a peg system. The goal was to avoid unsightly joints for display or photography. They released these bodies in all sorts of poses, including a kneeling body for posing dolls sitting properly at Japanese low tables.

Eventually Azone released their “Flection” body, which has joints. The Flection body is now the standard body for Pure Neemo dolls. It has a very interesting joint structure that allows a single body to make several poses with an overall more aesthetically-pleasing design than then average 1/6-scale doll body. I haven’t seen one in person, but it always looks very interesting in pictures! Azone currently makes the body in several sizes–XS, S, and M. (I’m not totally certain if there is or is not a “L” body, and there are hints of the 1/12-scale PiccoNeemo, not that I’ve seen one.) They use these bodies for character dolls from anime series and video games and also for their own EX Cute line of characters. (At one point I considered purchasing Secret Wonderland Chiika.)

Adorable “Secret Garden” Nina, in blue ruffles and lace; a recent July release from Azone~

Seeing some of Littlebearries’ adorable Pure Neemo girls made me think of “the Chiika that never was” and take another look at Pure Neemo–especially after she sent me a message trying to subtly nudge me towards adding a Secret Garden Nina to my doll family. n_~ Nina was cute–very cute–and her outfit was adorable–very adorable–but when I clicked on the link I didn’t feel an overwhelming pull to click “Reserve.” So, I didn’t, but I started browsing the other Pure Neemo that weren’t sold out–these little dolls don’t seem to much of a following when it comes to the English-speaking doll communities, but they’re still not the easiest things to purchase. They can sell out very quickly and finding one on the second-hand market isn’t always very easy.

I thought I was safe from the perils of Pure Neemo dolls–like most smaller dolls, they seem to swarm. An unsuspecting person buys one, thinking they will have one or two or a few, and then the Pure Neemos start messing with the poor person’s mind, slowly brainwashing that person into ordering more and more of these little, cute dolls until they wake up one morning to find that the house has been mortgaged for the umpteenth time and the quantity of Neemos has become suffocating. By that point, the Neemos are in charge and there’s nothing else that can be done but obey their commands. Sad, but true. I wanted to spare myself from all that.

I was doing pretty good, too… until I spotted a new release. A Chiika. Dressed in white. With straight, shiny pale hair. And gorgeous violet eyes. Her little head topped with an enormous white hair bow.

I’m blaming the Majokko Shop. Enablers, all of them.