Inked Again!

I got my first tattoo right after I graduated high school. I was living in London and I had it done at a shop that I later found out (via an article in The Face magazine) had been operating without a license for years and had put something like 75% of their clients in the emergency room with infections. I lucked out in that respect: no infections, just a really, really bad tattoo. The design was a drawing I'd made from a Renee Lalique haircomb (below, right), and what I got is significantly less identifiable (below, left). I have heard "kanji" more than a few times, and my favorite: "ink blot." So last year I started thinking about reworking the design into something else, or covering it up, but in spite of its lack of resemblence to my initial idea, I still felt nostalgic about my first tattoo.


Then it hit me- why not create a design around the "birds" that would be more interesting and beautiful but wouldn't take away from the original tattoo? So I gathered up a bunch of my Victorian postcards and went to see Jen Lee, who did my last tattoo. I think she did an incredible job with the design, especially the forget me nots! It is definitely dangerous, though, to know such a great tattoo artist who likes all the same things as me. I am already plotting the next one...