But I do believe in taking, and running with, any intriguing coincidences that come my way.
I went back to Everlasting today and met Mike. I liked him instantly. He looks like a hippie art-school student, with scruffy hair and a nose ring; on the Dianna scale of intimidation he ranks somewhere around a fluffy bunny rabbit. Excellent. We talked for a few minutes about the design and decided to set up an appointment. Unfortunately, he told me, it would have to be a few weeks away because his schedule's pretty full. "Oh, I'm in no hurry," I said, "This is a birthday present, and my birthday isn't until May."
"Oh," he asked, "What day?"
"May seventh," I told him. He grinned.
I have a new tattoo artist, and he has the same birthday as me. My first appointment with him is in late April, about two weeks before the birthday in question, and this will probably be the last time I'll blog about it for the next month. I have to talk about something else sometime, right? If it goes as well as I'm hoping, though, not only will I blog my head off, I'll probably also send him a birthday present. I hope he likes cookies... but then, I've never met anyone born on May seventh who didn't.
Posted by dianna at March 18, 2005 07:22 PMso, by pure coincidence, my roomate and I are talking about getting tattoos together. she wants a turtle. i want an orca.
she also wanted to get them done someplace on venice beach, and I cheerfully refused, and pointed out that we would be in San Francisco on the 8th & maybe my ex-boyfriend's ex-roomate would be nice enough to refer us to a reliable artist (I have a guy I'd like to go to, but he's in Victoria, and the point is to get them done together)
point being - would you be so nice as to refer us to reliable tattoo places? from the last few blog posts on the subject, you obviously know what you're talking about. it doesn't have to be Mike at Everlasting necessarily - just someplace that, if we brought in clip art of our respective marine life symbols, wouldn't screw it up. and it would make me feel MUCH better than going to one of the tattoo places jammed in between 99 cent pizza and bootleg T-shirts down on the Venice boardwalk.
Posted by: jillian at March 20, 2005 02:26 PMI'd be happy to share what I know. It's pretty damn limited, though, so a general call for Cementhorizon people to chime in is probably going to be much more useful.
The only place in San Francisco where I've personally been tattooed is Black and Blue in the Mission. I'd recommend them in a heartbeat, assuming of course that you find someone in their artists list whose style you like. I've been tattooed by Fish, who's not working there right now, and Rocio, who I think still is, and liked their work and their attitudes quite a lot. The shop is woman-owned and generally lacking in the sort of macho crap traditionally associated with tattoo shops (e.g., you can actually get tattooed in a private back room intead of right up in the front window of the shop facing the sidewalk).
For your comparison, from what I've seen, Sacred Rose down the street appears to be a woman-owned shop with a much higher degree of macho crap, and Everlasting is a male-owned shop with pretty minimal macho crap levels. They all have pretty much the same hourly and minimum prices, and they're all going to want you to call ahead and make an appointment, so then it's going to be up to either the artists' styles or who's available on your day.
Helpful?
Posted by: Dianna at March 20, 2005 03:58 PMI've been tattooed fairly extensively in the East Bay and elsewhere, and not so much in the city, but I can offer these tidbits from the two tattoos I had done in SF:
I had an enormous piece of color work done on my arm by Fish at Black & Blue. I want to marry her. People literally cross the street to compliment my arm. Sadly, I don't think she's taking new clients right now because she's in art school. But when Iâve been at the shop (Iâve had several pieces done by her) Iâve always been impressed with Black & Blue as a whole.
Black & Blueâs newest artist, Jean, evidently apprenticed under Colin Stevens, who did the kanji on my back (which Dianna made fun of in a previous post â thppbbbt!). Colin Stevens is an amazing artist, great with heavy lines and black work, a badass, and â especially for a total badass â a nice guy. For that reason, Iâd imagine that anyone who apprenticed with him is going to be amazing too. So you might check out Jean. (Iâd recommend Colin to you directly, but from what I understand heâs now the âsuper badassâ tattooist at Body Manipulations, with appointment-only hours, and only does fairly heavy-duty custom stuff - no more lame shit like mine!)
Conversation hijack: dude, I was totally not making fun of your kanji. I was pointing out that from the casual observer's perspective, it's not obvious how they're different from the ankle dolphins that you were talking about since they're about equally common. Actually, I'm not sure I should be protesting here, since a good-natured ribbing is probably less offensive than a rebuke for being too judgmental. Take your pick of which you'd prefer, I guess?
Posted by: Dianna at March 20, 2005 09:28 PMWhat the hell does Fish need to be in art school for, anyway? That's like cats taking sleeping lessons.
Posted by: Dianna at March 20, 2005 09:34 PMMaking fun of does not necessarily = bad. I think I've now joined you in making good-natured fun of my stupid back kanji, which clearly does not mean that I don't love them.
Fish needs art school like, um, a fish needs a bicycle? I totally agree.
On a slightly unrelated note, there was a woman next to me at the bar tonight who, in addition to being generally hot, had the cutest septum piercing which added to the whole picture in only good ways. Her girlfriend seemed to think so too, as did I and most of the other girls there. So that's it; I'm overcoming my wussiness and going for it. Saturday? Saturday. Gottsi. Me and you. Plus at least one piercing, with a probable maximum of three. Lollipops anyone?
Posted by: katie at March 20, 2005 11:28 PMi've been tattooed by yutaro at braindrops though he's not there anymore. but the other people there are really nice and have some very good work. most require an appointment in advance, so i'd recommend calling first. the shop itself is also excellent with private rooms for each artist and general lovely ambiance. i would recommend phillip because he's excellent though he mostly does tribal and oriental style tattoos but he probably has a more full schedule than cecilia.
Posted by: michele at March 20, 2005 11:54 PMwhoops. sorry. my ability to make that link correctly = lame. well, it still works though.
also, i'm pretty sure they have other tattooists there who aren't listed on the website. i'm actually a little confused by their website right now. you can ask if there's other tattooists if you call there.
Posted by: michele at March 20, 2005 11:55 PMNod to Michele for making that link hilariously janky but still working.
Posted by: katie at March 21, 2005 12:25 AMI know I've said this before, but I'll say it again. My hands-down favorite thing about the Braindrops website is the picture of Paul (piercer) as the tragic glamour boy of the year.
Aaaaaaand Michele's link is fixed. It was amusing, but I thought in the interest of clarity it might be nice to clean it up a bit.
Posted by: Dianna at March 21, 2005 07:49 AM
this is outstanding!! Thank you girls, so very very much. I feel much more confident armed with all this reputable information.
BTW, Dianna - congratulations on finding your artist for your tattoo. It sounds like it's going to be a fantastic success.
Posted by: jillian at March 21, 2005 09:16 AM