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Gloved hands tattooing a design onto a forearm.

Stokes Croft · Bristol

Real hands.
Real ink.
No transfers off a screen.

Four chairs, one back room, and everything drawn for the person it is going on. Book a chair, or come on a Saturday and take your chances.

NineSwallows

We draw everything first

Nothing goes on skin until you have seen it on paper and said yes. That is one appointment before the one you booked, it is free, and it is the reason nobody leaves here with a design they were talked into.

Drawn, not picked off a wall.

The Work

Four recent pieces. Scroll and they deal like a deck.

A forearm covered in a colour sleeve of flowers and leaves.

Full colour sleeve

Eleven sittings

A black spider design on a man's upper arm.

Blackwork, upper arm

One sitting

A forearm with a shaded swirl design in grey and teal.

Grey wash, half sleeve

Five sittings

An upper arm filled with a bright, many-coloured design.

Colour, upper arm

Three sittings

Who is in this week

Four of us, and we do not cover for each other: you book the person whose work you liked.

  • Ro Blackwork, ornamental Tue to Sat
  • Mattie Neo-traditional, colour Wed to Sun
  • Cass Fine line, lettering Thu to Sat
  • Bern Japanese, large scale By arrangement

Where we are

Ninety-one Stokes Croft, above the record shop. The blue door, not the green one.

Five minutes down the hill and you are at the harbour, which is where most people go afterwards to look at it in the daylight.

Open
Tuesday to Sunday, 11 to 7
Walk-ins
Saturdays, from 11, first come
Deposit
£50, comes off the final price
Under 18s
No, and no exceptions
The shop window at night, lit up, with a neon tattoo sign.
Boats moored along the harbour under a cloudy sky.

Book a chair

Tell us what you want, where it is going and roughly how big. You will get a drawing appointment first, then a date. The deposit holds it.

Start a booking

or call 0117 000 0000

Photography: Myotus ( CC-BY-4.0 ) , Stiller Beobachter from Ansbach, Germany ( CC-BY-2.0 ) , istolethetv from Hong Kong, China ( CC-BY-2.0 ) , Muffet ( CC-BY-2.0 ) , Tony Alter from Newport News, USA ( CC-BY-2.0 ) , Billie Grace Ward from New York, USA ( CC-BY-2.0 ) , Michael Alford ( CC-BY-4.0 )