Donn

Tattooers with no tattoos are just Tourist and should be treated as such. They are just looking at the cash and waiting for the next thing to come along.

You feel uncomfortable then tell the guy to stop.....get up....and walk out!
I'm not saying that silence is consent BUT if you say nothing then nothing changes!
I have been a tattooed female for 30 years now and I have heard all kinds of shit come out of tattooers mouths both male and female! The business has changed drastically I guess BUT when I was first getting tattooed.....it was always assumed if you weren't tough enough to take the banter then MAYBE you shouldn't get tattooed because the world was gonna give you a whole lot more shit about being a tattooed woman than the banter you were gonna get in the shop.....including this statement!
I was terrified to walk into the shop when i got my first tattoo in fact the two ladies that went with me didn't go in and I went in on my own! I had heard all kinds of things about tattoo shops and although they were cool to me I am sure they weren't to everyone! Anyway.....what i am saying is they didn't offer wine and cheese like the "salons" do now! Most were street shops and this kind of comment probably would have been said as you were walking through the door instead of them waiting for you to get into the chair!
I am sorry that you had a bad experience BUT this is honestly mild compared to some of the things I have seen and probably even said to men and women in tattoo shops!
I am a year and a half into my apprenticeship....and I like women! Would I make a comment like this? Probably not.....but I can't honestly say! I do know I have said much worse......it's a tattoo shop after all!
If people don't like my opinion oh well.....but don't try to change it because you won't! ;)
And of course there weren't tattoo shops on every corner of the city either so if you wanted to be tattooed then you had to deal with whatever was thrown your way!
I HATE what these stupid ass TV shows have done to this business.....I enjoyed the way it was much more....too bad the new generation had it ruined for them!

Honestly I used to comment all the time but i put this site on my strike list for a while because of this exact reason. Thanks for sharing your experiences too. Not saying i've never said anything negative but some of us .. it seems like they go on this site constantly and look for questions that could be dumb questions.
While I do think some of these questions are dumb or whatever we all could choose to not answer them and do something more productive with our time... No?
I understand some of us have amazing tattoos and probably heard it all but WE ARENT TATTOO ARTIST!! How do we know what tattoo artist are annoyed by??? Actually all the artist that I've been in contact with have been super nice and professional. Also if someone walks in a tattoo shop with no tattoos and ask questions like .... I'm sure that these artist are more than happy to explain . If someone who has a lot of tattoos then that is another story.
I feel extremely lucky to have tattoos from these amazing artist! Jumping on anyone who has a question that you may think is basic or stupid then we have a choice. Either we can understand where they are coming from and answer or don't answer at all.
Oh in this day in age they should know already.. Really!???

I'm going to elaborate on this from the report @Lance gave of Shige's seminar from this year's SFO convention:
So based on that I'm going to say that doing straight copies of Shige's tattoos is garbage and that even if the copy is technically well done it's soulless and completely misses the essence of the tattoo.

Have an appointment today at the Museum to have pics taken of my Stewart Robson back-piece. Not exactly sure how it works regarding which pieces get displayed. I am honored to have such a beautiful piece from Mr. Robson and the chance to display it.

Great Lakes opened up yesterday. How many of you heathens stopped in and got tattoos?

Joel D. Long Art Exhibition - Boulder CO | 15th Street Studio
Asian Inspired Scrolls Art Show by Joel D Long | TAM Blog

I have a real job where I work with my hands and don't have a computer, I don't have time for this nonsense.

I have no idea what your talking about so would a link be possible?

got this from claudia de sabe yesterday:


really stoked on how it turned out, and she's light-handed so wasn't as painful as i was expecting

Dagger through neck, Valerie Vargas

I am always surprised when people open up shops with the name that a simple google search would show is pretty common and already in use. If your going to put all the effort into starting a shop a new name seems like a fairly simple thing.

One man's ceiling is another man's floor.
There are shops I don't care for, but what I see as one thing, someone else sees differently.
Guess I'd rather talk about shops I think are outstanding than name the ones I don't care for.

I am going to have a booth at both Austin and San Angelo so if your coming through stop by and say hello. It's always good to meet the people you only know from online...fb, instagram, forums, etc... So stop off at the Tattooagogo booth and let me know who ya are from here.

I really never considered this a traditional tattoo site, but more a quality tattoos site. Traditional is the sense maybe that we talk about people who have established themselves in the tattoo world, more than recent trends in tattoo design. Although some would say getting traditional tattoos is kind of in style right now, others would say they never go out of style. But ultimately I think people who do quality work in any style get a fair amount of respect here.
But I guess this site can be a lot of different things to a lot of different people and regardless of how we see it, we all seem to be a fan of some of the stuff discussed here.

If you read my whole post I said that the few exceptions are owned by people with deep roots in the tattoo community not just somebody jumping in the business as an investment. lori from NYA spent years managing one of new yorks biggest shops before she ever opened her shop.

@catchchaser
Just as long as you realize that no truly good tattooer will work for you and that you will only attract the flakier of tattooers because no reputable tattooer will work for you for any length of time. Any decent tattooer that does come your way will jump ship for a real shop as soon as one owned by a tattooer offers him a job. Its the difference between working for a fast food place and a gourmet restaurant, other than a quick paycheck you can't offer them real job advancement because you aren't really part of the business and have no connections.
I am just being honest with you because the few quality shops that are owned by non-tattooers are owned by people who had years in the business before they ever opened a shop, both in working in shops and getting tattooed by top quality people.
I won't even say good luck because I don't really wish it upon you but feel you should know what road lays ahead of you.

I can only speculate, but I doubt Frith Street was started so someones 18 year old son could get an apprenticeship..

If you read my whole post I said that the few exceptions are owned by people with deep roots in the tattoo community not just somebody jumping in the business as an investment. lori from NYA spent years managing one of new yorks biggest shops before she ever opened her shop.

@catchchaser
Just as long as you realize that no truly good tattooer will work for you and that you will only attract the flakier of tattooers because no reputable tattooer will work for you for any length of time. Any decent tattooer that does come your way will jump ship for a real shop as soon as one owned by a tattooer offers him a job. Its the difference between working for a fast food place and a gourmet restaurant, other than a quick paycheck you can't offer them real job advancement because you aren't really part of the business and have no connections.
I am just being honest with you because the few quality shops that are owned by non-tattooers are owned by people who had years in the business before they ever opened a shop, both in working in shops and getting tattooed by top quality people.
I won't even say good luck because I don't really wish it upon you but feel you should know what road lays ahead of you.

i stopped caring about shit like this, or i'd be angry 24/7/365. either way i'm tattooing and will continue to tattoo, i don't give a shit what's going on where...

Have a couple of kids. Time starts to go real fast.

Some school rep came into the shop one time and tried to get us to go to some sort of career day type thing. I considered it for a second, but ultimately declined. I feel like their should be a little bit of nervousness and a element of perceived danger surrounding a tattoo shop. I always like the idea of the tattoo shop being off limits and the countdown till we turned 18 and the discussion what we would get when that time came. I didn't want to ruin it for those kids. Also I don't want a bunch of underage kids hanging out around the shop. They seem to see the big neon sign and those that are interested make it over there anyway, but not trying to start a daycare center. Maybe as I spend more time in this world my view will change, but that is how i see it now.

Tattooers with no tattoos are just Tourist and should be treated as such. They are just looking at the cash and waiting for the next thing to come along.

Tattooers with no tattoos are just Tourist and should be treated as such. They are just looking at the cash and waiting for the next thing to come along.