The same room, year after year
Russell Street has never been the flashiest address in Halifax. That has always rather suited the place. Paradise has stayed put here through every change of fashion in the trade — the tribal years, the infinity symbols, the watercolour wave, and the swing back to bold traditional work.
What has not changed is the way a job starts. Somebody comes through the door with an idea. Sometimes a printout, sometimes a story, quite often nothing more than "I want something for my dad".
We talk it through and draw it. Nobody is asked to commit to anything on the first visit.
Custom work and cover-ups
Custom means what it says. The design is drawn for the piece of you it is going on, not picked off a sheet and resized. Placement changes everything, because a shoulder moves in a way a forearm does not.
Styles run from bold traditional through black and grey realism to portraits, florals, mandalas and lettering. Colour when the design wants it. Black and grey when you want something that ages well.
Cover-ups are a separate discipline, and not everything can be covered in one go. Dense old black usually needs lightening with laser first. A small dark name can hide under a much larger design, but only if that design has somewhere for the darkness to live.
Bring the old tattoo in and we will tell you which of those it is, before you have spent anything.
Worked in the studio
- Custom artwork
- Cover-ups and reworks
- Black and grey
- Portraits
- Traditional
- Floral and mandala
- Lettering
- Freehand
Piercing
A first lobe, and everything after it. That includes the pieces plenty of studios turn away: dermal anchors and surface bars. Those two have to be placed properly or they migrate back out within the year.
Everything is opened from a sealed pouch on the counter in front of you. You leave with the aftercare talk whether or not you think you need it.
Laser removal
Laser removal runs from the same studio. It either clears a piece altogether, or fades it back far enough for a new design to sit over the top. The work is done across several visits with weeks in between, because the body carries the broken-up ink away slowly.
Anyone who tells you a tattoo will vanish in one appointment is selling you something. Black ink lifts most readily. Greens and light blues are the stubborn ones, and there is a patch test before the first proper session.
Laser hair removal is offered from the same room and the same appointment book.
Does it hurt, and other honest answers
Does it hurt? Yes, but less than people expect and in a duller way than they imagine. Ribs, sternum, feet and the inside of the arm are the hard ones. Outer thigh and forearm are the gentle ones.
What will it cost? A tattoo is priced on the time it takes, so a small design and a half sleeve are two different conversations. Come in for the free consultation and you will leave knowing the figure.
How long will it take? A small piece is under an hour. A half sleeve is several sittings. We give you a realistic number at the consultation rather than an optimistic one.
Can I bring somebody? Yes, one person. It is a small studio and it works better that way.
Do I need to book? Not always. If a chair is free, a walk-in is fine. For anything sizeable, ring ahead.
Do I need ID? Always. Eighteen for tattooing, no exceptions, and no amount of arguing at the counter has ever changed that.
Should I eat first? Yes. Come having eaten and having slept. Skip the drink the night before, because alcohol thins the blood and makes the work harder.
Aftercare
Treat a new tattoo like a wound, because for a fortnight that is exactly what it is. Wash it with unperfumed soap and pat it dry. Use a thin film of aftercare cream rather than a thick one, and keep it out of the sun.
The short version
- Clean, dry, thin cream
- No sun for a fortnight
- Showers, not baths
- No swimming
- Do not pick it
- Come back if you are worried
No swimming pools and no baths. Do not pick at the flakes, however satisfying that looks. If anything looks angry rather than merely sore, come back in — we would far rather see it than hear about it a month later.