darling frida

Hi loves,

The tattoo epidemic continues and no, it doesn’t look like it’s stopping any time soon. I was watching a Youtube video the other day where someone was talking about how they needed to calm down with their tattoos because they were only in their early 20s and if they carried on getting tattooed at the rate they currently were, they’d have no room left by the time they were 30. I was like…did I…did I make this video? Is that me? One of my biggest fears is running out of room but I love and am impacted by so many things I just…have to get them inked, but I’m going to be that way for the rest of my life and unfortunately I won’t be able to keep it up at this rate so, I’m trying to make a conscious effort not to keep booking tattoos in but I can’t help it, cry.

First of all I apologise for the awful photos you’re about to see in this post, they definitely don’t do the tattoo justice. I couldn’t wait to take photos because I was too excited so these are awful angles since I had to take the pics myself (of the back of my arm) and there’s also still ink everywhere because I hadn’t washed it down at this point so if you’re wondering what all the dark patches are…yep. Once it’s healed I’ll update this post with proper photos since it’ll look a lot more crisper and cleaner then.

Anyway, mini breakdown over with –

Age= 21
Placement = Back of left arm
Pain = 2/10
Price = £105

As you can see, this is a tattoo of darling Frida. When people know I have a tattoo booked in they always ask what I’m getting and when I proceeded to tell them this time that I was getting a portrait of Frida Kahlo, they all looked at me like I had 3 heads. Apparently, (rant incoming), no one has ever seen or heard of Frida Kahlo, one of the most famous and iconic women in history. But then again, that was like when I got this tattoo and apparently not a single male had ever seen that symbol before in their life, so there you go I suppose. Sometimes I really do worry for the older generation.

Anyway, back to Frida – I mentioned a while ago now in one of my other tattoo posts that I wanted a feminist / mother nature-type tattoo but didn’t really know what to get. I wanted a piece that would incorporate both but was waiting for the right idea to come into my head and alas, Frida arrived. The beautiful, strong, amazing and iconic woman we all needed. Mother Earth herself. I didn’t know what type of tattoo specifically to get to resemble Frida, as I didn’t want her face on me or anything like that, but an artist I follow on Instagram had started doing faceless portrait tattoos and suddenly I was like wait, yes, this could work. I sent photos of the faceless portraits to the artist who was going to be doing my tattoo like, do you think you could do one of these but in the style of Frida?? And she was like yes, yes I could.

As you can see, the tattoo is an outline of her profile, complete with her signature brows, braid and floral crown – I love the fact this is faceless as I wanted the eyebrows to stand out by themselves as of course, they’re iconic. You only need to take one look at those brows to realise you’re looking at Frida Kahlo. This has however, lead everyone who’s seen the tattoo to ask if it’s only half finished or where the rest of her face is, and then continue to look at me like I’ve still got 3 heads when I tell them that it is fully finished and I didn’t want facial features. Hooray.

It was really fun to play around with this piece as I could customise it the way I wanted to. Normally when I’m customising my pieces I’m only messing around with florals, but to actually be able to customise…a person, this time? I loved it. I could tweak every detail to the way I wanted it – the earrings she was wearing, the style of eyebrows she had, the way her flower crown would look etc. – my artist captured it all beautifully and did such an amazing job, I absolutely adore this piece and am so glad I have it.

I’m so in love with it I can’t stop staring at it. I’ve literally just been getting up to look in the mirror every 5 seconds because it’s so beautiful and I can’t believe it’s on my body forever. Like wow. How gorgeous. This is art. When my artist showed it to me I was squealing, she was like “do you like it???” and I was like are you KIDDING, it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Get this on me right now. (I didn’t say the last part of course but I was definitely thinking it).

It was so inexpensive as well?? I couldn’t believe it. The artist had already quoted me for a price but it ended up being lower than what she’d said and I think because I was so in love with anyway I was like wait…that’s it? I actually asked her to repeat the price just to make sure I’d heard correctly HA. I know it’s mostly just line work therefore the price makes sense but still, amazing.

This tattoo was also probably the easiest one I’ve ever gotten, it literally couldn’t have gone smoother. I’ve never had a problem when getting tattooed before but this one was just so simple, so quick and I was back home again before I knew it. I don’t think I’ve ever really spoken in-depth about the process of getting a tattoo before but let me know if you guys want a post on that (????), but anyway, I arrived early (tattoo tip – always arrive earlier than your appointment time) and she was ready for me straight away. I signed the forms and then we started on sizing and placement which took about 10 minutes (aka, super quick for me) – we got the stencil on, changed it around once and before I knew it I was getting tattooed. The tattoo altogether took just over an hour and it was literally job done and I was outta there. So good. Like seriously, my appointment wasn’t even early yet by the time we’d finished I still had the whole day ahead of me anyway. So good. 10/10 the best tattoo experience I’ve had – combine that with the fact this is the most gorgeous piece of art I’ve ever seen and we’ve got one happy Chlo.

I adore Frida, so so so much, I really do. My favourite quote from her (and one of my favourite quotes in general ever) is this:

“I used to think I was the strangest person in the world, but then I thought, there are so many people in the world, there must be someone just like me who feels flawed and bizarre in the same ways I do… I would imagine her, and imagine that she must be out there thinking of me, too. Well, I hope that if you are out there and read this, know that, yes, it’s true I’m here, and I’m just as strange as you.”

Every time I read that quote it brings tears to my eyes and sometimes makes me cry, because I feel like I wrote it myself. Like she just took that from my soul and said it out loud. She’s talking about people like me, girls like me, women like me. She’s talking about me. She wrote that for me. I know she did.

All my love,

Chloe .xx

🌺

Previous Tattoo Posts
1, 2 & 3
4
5
6
7 & 8
9
10
11
12
13