WHEN people hear horror stories of a negative tattoo experience, their first question is often “how did you find your artist?”
After hours of research, one disappointed woman’s tattoo artist seemed perfect – until he reportedly neglected to draw her design, misled her about the price, asked for a second session, and finally skipped town.
Tristan Reeves told her TikTok followers that after she turned 18, she decided to get a large thigh tattoo dedicated to the important women in her life.
“Because this was my first big tattoo, I did a lot of research,” Reeves explained.
She found a tattoo artist who created designs in the style she liked, browsed his portfolio, and decided that his body of work was in line with her needs. She also read his reviews, which were positive, and learned he had been on the show Ink Master.
Reeves showed a screengrab of a black-and-white floral design she brought to her artist as inspiration and explained that she’d chosen to replace the blooms in the original with native Arizona flowers.
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“The idea was to have that style of tattoo, and have each flower represent an important woman I had in my life,” Reeves explained. A butterfly at the top would represent her mom.
Her artist was on board with the idea. “Just sent me pictures of what you want the flowers to look like,” he requested.
The research Reeves completed led her to expect a consultation, at least one meeting before the day of the appointment, and a security deposit for the big-ticket tatt.
But the artist emailed Reeves with an appointment date before even sending over a draft of the design.
Reeves followed up with questions and ideas but said she “didn’t hear back from him for about three or four days,” even though the appointment was just a week away.
Then, two days before the appointment, she received a response.
“Two days before the tattoo, he emailed me and said ‘hey, don’t worry about the deposit,'” Reeves said.
She claimed the artist told her the tattoo would cost $750 and take about 6 hours to complete.
“That was all the communication I got from him before the tattoo,” Reeves said. But it was the information she’d asked for, and days later, she arrived at the shop.
When she walked in and introduced herself to the artist, he greeted her, then excused himself for “just a minute.”
He was reportedly gone for around an hour.
“He hadn’t drawn the tattoo yet,” Reeves said. She was shocked by the design he brought back.
She “stared” at the design, which had only four flowers and one butterfly on top, with none of the leaves, branches, or other detail she had discussed in her initial emails.
The artist dropped another bombshell when Reeves brought up the missing elements.
“He told me,” ‘Oh, this is definitely going to be a two-session tattoo,'” Reeves remembered.
And the second session would be another several hundred dollars.
There had been no discussion of a second session prior to their first meeting, Reeves claimed, but it was her first experience with such a large tattoo, and she decided to go forward anyway.
“I know that’s dumb, but I really wanted this tattoo,” she admitted.
As the artist was tattooing her, he brought up the color scheme.
This was another shock since Reeves said she had been clear about the simple, colorless design she asked for.
“I just wanted the linework, the black and white look,” she explained.
Reeves said that the artist wouldn’t drop the idea. “He said, ‘you are so pale that colors would look really good on you.'”
So, once again, Reeves felt pressured into a decision and acquiesced to the artist’s pressure. “‘It’s gonna look so much better,'” he reportedly said.
After the first session, Reeves agreed to follow up via email to schedule the next visit, since she had to take time off work to do so.
She convinced herself that once the other elements of the design were added in, she would like it, and wrote him with her availability.
“I didn’t hear back from him for about two days,” Reeves remembered.
Then, the next week, she went into the shop to try and speak in person. That’s when she learned the man had moved away and no longer worked at the shop.
Reeves did find a new artist to finish the tattoo, and now, she said, it’s “fine.” But she warned others not to make the mistakes that lead to her unsatisfactory design.
“If you want a tattoo a certain way, take your artist’s advice under consideration, but ultimately, get what you want,” she reminded viewers.
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And, adding a final insult to the injury: of all the women she dedicated her tattoo to, “half of them don’t even talk to me anymore,” Reeves revealed.
Even though those estrangements are unrelated to the traumatic tattoo experience, they contribute to Reeves’ tattoo regret, she said.
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