Ink gets everywhere.
Don’t worry, it doesn’t magically just stain your skin forever.
It’s literally on all our clothes.
And it can go through clothes.
Buying cheap gloves is never worth it.
Not unless you want purple hands for a while.
No one comes into the shop one day and walks out with a full sleeve the next.
A full sleeve can take about 25 hours, with healing time between appointments. And that’s not even taking into account that some tattooists will have long waiting lists.
Clients who don’t listen to aftercare instructions are usually the same clients who complain about their tattoos.
Carpal tunnel syndrome and swollen knuckles can be part of the job.
Carpal tunnel syndrome is a painful wrist condition often caused by repetitive motion.
Drawing with a heavy tattoo machine for hours at a time can take its toll.
As can backache if you’re working at a tricky angle.
We can’t decide what tattoo you should get.
People actually just walk in and say, “I want a tattoo on my arm” – with no more details than that. If you don’t know what you want, you’re not ready to have a tattoo.
And even when people think they know what they want, it can be pretty hard to understand them.
“I want something like this.” *Does a load of random hand movements and hands over pictures of three completely different tattoo styles*
There’s no way we’re doing a drawing without a deposit.
We’re not just going to draw something for free to “see if you like it”.
We’re happy to make changes before we put ink to skin, but that doesn’t mean it’s not slightly annoying.
Of course we want our clients to be as happy as possible with a permanent mark on their body, but redoing basically the same drawing again and again can be annoying.
And writing the same word out in 10 different styles can get tedious.
We really aren’t magicians.
There’s only so much tattoo you can fit on a finger/behind an ear.
Asking for a discount or complaining about our prices is annoying and insulting.
A permanent mark on your skin is the kind of thing you should invest in.
All tattoos hurt.
But it’s true that some parts of the body are more sensitive than others.
It’s pretty hard to tattoo someone who’s freaking out about the pain or even fainting.
You do get people who moan out loud and cry in the chair, and we’ll probably tell you to take a break if that happens.
It’s really annoying when you bring all your friends and family into the studio.
It’s great if you want to bring one person for support, but any more and it starts to feel a bit crowded.
Nothing is worse than a no-show.
We lose money and time, and there’s no way we’re going to tattoo you again if you’re flaky.
It’s definitely not a 9–5 job, and you’ll pretty much have to give up Saturdays forever.
We don’t earn as much as you pay us.
We usually have to pay the shop some of it, and a lot goes toward supplies.
Everything we work with needs to be super sterilised, so it’s really frustrating when you drop a whole load of sterilised cling film on the floor.
Part of the job can be shaving a man’s bum.
Seriously, we get really intimate with some clients.
Doing big blocks of black can be a little bit dull.
Don’t worry, we’re still concentrating – but it is kind of just like colouring in.
Sometimes when we’re proud of a tattoo, we wish we could print it off and frame it.
It can be sad watching it walk out the door.
It’s amazing actually being paid to do art every da
But meeting people and learning a little about their lives is definitely the best part of the job.
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