Last Minute Valentine’s Plans Lead to Permanent Ink

Flash tattoos offer quick ink at lower prices. The catch? You get what you get!

Image: Flash tattoo done by Leilah at Skinblu tattoo studio in Brooklyn.

“Okay ladies…looks like we’re getting tattoos after Parent Trap.” 

The message lights up the group chat, along with an enticing flier full of charming Valentines themed sketches and big bubble letters advertising “$50-100$ flashes.” Designs are circled, placement is discussed, parental approval is scoffed at. And just like that, a snowy Saturday at the movies ends with ink. 

“Flashes,” named for their quick turn around time, are tattoos designed in advance by the artist. Usually offered at drop in events, with discount prices and no appointment required. For shops, flash events provide an opportunity to lure new customers and spotlight up and coming artists - free from the restrictions of custom tattoo design. 

Custom tattoos are often booked months in advance, and in demand artists often involve a lengthy design and approval process. For those looking for the fun of a new tattoo, without the commitment to something deep, meaningful, and delayed, flash events offer a chance for an effortless and exciting tattoo experience at a fraction of the cost. 

After stumbling across the digital flier for this flash event on an instagram story, my friend and I hop two buses and a train to arrive at Skinblu Tattoo in Brooklyn. The shop is painted in a calming blue, with hand drawn murals in oil pastel and spray paint covering the wide open floor plan. A man with a butterfly tattoo on his neck takes our coats. I make it clear that I am just an observer, uninterested in breaking the tattoo pact I made with my mom under penalty of death, and he sets to work asking my friend about the tattoo design that caught her attention. 

Madi, a 22 year old graduate student who already has two tattoos, picked out a realistic drawing of an eye with a heart shaped pupil. In less than the time it takes for us to break down the latest episode of Euphoria, sizing and placement have been agreed upon, and a bright purple stencil looks out from Madi’s forearm. 

The tattoo artist comes hand in hand with the design, her name is Leilah and she’s a junior artist at Skinblu. She greets us with a smile and lipstick imprints as eyeshadow.She settles Madi into the chair, arm held straight out. “Some people feel weird about grazing my boob. It’s hard not to in this position,” she says reassuringly, “And besides, I get to tattoo you, you get to cop a feel. It works out for everybody.” 

The tattoo is only two inches long, most flashes are kept small and simple to avoid long lines at the drop-in events, which usually last no longer than a weekend. However, the shop has quite a few open chairs on account of the snow and the fact that it’s a relatively new business. Leilah takes her time with the photorealistic details, beginning with a series of delicate strokes curving into eyelashes at the crook of Madi’s elbow. There’s a confessional atmosphere to our triangle of black chairs, and as Leilah bends over the stencil in a relaxed concentration, we begin to talk. 

Leilah has only been tattooing for three years. Before this, she was a textile design student at the Fashion Institute of Technology. She explains that she began tattooing after searching for something with more creative freedom and interaction. “I just feel like it was a dead space,” she says of her former college campus, the electric buzz of needles filling the air. “My aunt had a hookup with the owner, the lead artist guy here. I’ve yet to meet him. He’s been in LA for that long. He did all the art on the walls.” 

Madi talks about her previous experience with flash events, her second of two previous tattoos features a 1920’s flapper smoking a cigarette, “It was a freehand flash event,” she explains “I was so nervous while he was tattooing, he kept asking ‘Should we add this?’” 

“That’s the most fun an artist can have,” Leilah admires. ‘Those are always the tattoos that turn out the best too.” You can tell that she is in love with her work, and that the chance to tattoo her own designs is thrilling. As she continues tattooing, we talk about everything from our varying highschool experiences across to the US, to climate change, to feeling out of place with peers. Sometimes Leilah remains quiet, head intensely bent over her progress. Other times, she is at ease, casually interjecting points into our rapidly shifting conversation. 

After about an hour, the tattoo is done. Our conversation dies out in awe as Leilah wipes the purple, black, and red from the finished piece while the man with the butterfly films it for social media. The tattoo is new and shiny, with white highlights brightening it’s waterline and the reflections across the heart shaped pupil. Leilah squeals in delight as she takes a final photograph of the tattoo against a painted backdrop and seals it with a clear bandage.  

For an idea that feels somewhat akin to speed dating, the experience of getting a flash tattoo had been remarkably intimate. While the design did not originate in a significant core belief, or appropriately meaningful memory from Madi, Leilah’s enthusiasm for her own work and the spontaneity of the permanent choice bring a sense of fate to the design. The more we look at it, we agree, the more it looks like Madi. 

The pictures of the tattoo are already posted to Instagram by the time we reach the other side of the street. Madi looks at them with fascination as we wait for the bus back home. “I’ll definitely be coming back both to this shop and this artist,” she comments. “And now I’ll always remember the day we went to see Parent Trap.”