Why DO so many smart women have tattoos
Chic dresses, stylish hats — but many at Ascot’s Ladies Day had arms you’d once only have seen on sailors
THE outfits were carefully chosen, with an acceptable amount of knee and cleavage on show and tastefully cut. Hats were elaborate and expensive, the right mix of jaunty and feminine. Most of the ladies at Royal Ascot this week were looking every bit the array of traditional English roses — then something unexpected would catch the eye.
A tattoo. Not just any old tattoo, but a complete work of art, from bicep to wrist. Flowers, peacocks, butterflies, musical and Chinese symbols inked across the exposed white flesh of backs, hands and feet. All displayed with pride.
Not only were they in abundance at Ascot, tattoos are seemingly to be found everywhere nowadays. Once associated with sailors and prisoners, they’re just as likely to be spotted sneaking beneath the shirt sleeve of your bank manager, creeping up the ankle of your child’s class teacher or hidden under the gowns of a Queen’s Counsel at crown court.
One recent survey suggested that nearly one in three of us now has a tattoo. It’s estimated 20 million Brits have at least one — an extraordinary figure. About 1.5 million tattoos are inked every year, making it an industry worth around £80 million.
And while tattoos are still more common among the under-30s, the desire for one increasingly seems to transcend age and background.
Take actress Judi Dench who has ‘carpe diem’ inked on her right wrist, a present from her daughter for her 81st birthday. Then there’s TV presenter David Dimbleby, who had a scorpion tattooed on his shoulder at 75.
Samantha Cameron has a dolphin on her right foot (which she always covered up for visits to the Queen).
And, of course, fuelling the trend is a dizzying array of celebrities, who seem to compete over who can cram the most artwork onto their expensively toned flesh.
Singer Harry Styles has 62, David Beckham more than 40, actress Angelina Jolie around 18, while singer Cheryl Cole has 12, including a giant rose covering her entire lower back and buttocks, which cost her £12,000 and took more than 15 hours to complete.
David Beckham’s 18-year- old son Brooklyn was recently photographed getting his first tattoo, with his parents’ full blessing.
Yet, despite their prevalence, many still wince when they see a tattoo. Ascot doesn’t have a policy on tattoos, although in polite society, the full ‘sleeve’ designs usually attract a fair few disapproving tuts, particularly if painted on to a young, attractive female.
Rather than statements of individuality, to many, tattoos look like vandalism — a mistake that’s going to be painfully regretted one day. SO
wITH residual stigma still attached to tattoos, why are so many middleclass people — especially women — having them? For some, it seems, their bodies are almost like an extension of their social media pages — a blank canvas on which to ‘post’ the major events, loves and losses of their lives.
where we once grieved the loss of a loved one by sending a wreath, today it’s common to engrave a flower on a wrist to mark the occasion.
Emma Delaney, 35, a trained solicitor turned HR director, who lives in Kent, had her first tattoo as a teenager. A talented sportswoman, at 18 she won judo gold in the youth Olympics and got a permanent souvenir of the achievement by having the Japanese symbol for luck tattooed at the base of her spine.
‘I paid £45 for it,’ she says. ‘Like lots of teenagers, I got it done without much thought. I told my mum and dad it was a henna tattoo, because getting a proper tattoo was absolutely frowned on. They would have thought it was tacky and tarty.’ Now, however, as a professional, highly respectable mother- of-two, she has an evergrowing collection.
So far, she has no regrets — not even having the name of her exhusband etched in Japanese characters on the side of her right foot. She insists she’s not tempted to get it removed, even though her new partner dislikes it.
‘He’s part of the story of my life, the father of my children,’ she explains.
Her largest tattoo is of a lily that snakes from her left hip to her ribcage. ‘They all mean something,’ she says. ‘The lily is to commemorate a close friend who died after a long battle with cancer. The last bouquet she sent me was lilies with the quote: “She believed she could, so she did.” ’
Those words are also inked on her body. Emma says she’s proud of her tattoos, but accepts they are not to everyone’s taste. Hence, she’s always restricted inking to areas that aren’t visible when she’s formally dressed for work.
Fascinatingly, many — like Emma — go so far as to describe the experience of being inked as ‘addictive’, surprising when you consider how painful it can be.
David Beckham has confessed to getting a thrill out of the pain that leaves him hungry for more. That is something Emma says she can definitely identify with. Her largest tattoo, the lily, took six hours to complete three years ago.
‘The pain was worse than childbirth,’ she recalls. ‘My body felt like it was going into shock. The only way I can describe it is that it was like a fierce sweat. But I definitely got a buzz out of it. It left me
feeling on a high, both while it was happening and afterwards.’
Dr Stuart Ross, a senior lecturer in psychology at Newman University, Birmingham, says tattoos are addictive because of the physical and psychological processes they trigger. He decided to study the mental benefits of experiencing pain after getting his first tattoo in his late 20s. Bizarrely, it came after he was asked to talk to a tattoo artist friend suffering from depression, and thought it would help if his friend tattooed him while they chatted. Dr Ross chose an ambitious, one-and-ahalf feet- long dragon that encompassed his left shoulder, part of his back and left arm.
‘I under- estimated both the pain and what a commitment it would be — the first session alone lasted four hours and it took 20 hours to complete — but afterwards there was a great feeling of achievement. It felt like a rite of passage.’
He was struck by how visceral the experience was, and believes this is part of the attraction for modern urbanites. ‘In a world where everything is sanitised, where we have lost the animalistic elements of life, having a tattoo takes you right back to what it is to be human.’
HeSayS it’s a surprisingly nurturing act, too: ‘afterwards you have to keep the wound clean — bathe it and apply creams to help the skin heal. Having a tattoo actually becomes an act of self care.’ It’s also a way to take control over a part of the body that you don’t like — something likely to appeal to young women with body image issues. In Dr Ross’s case, his tattoo covers vitiligo, a condition that’s left his skin covered in white blotches. The ‘ high’ that some experience is partly physiological. When you’re in pain the body releases a cocktail of neuro transmitters, including endorphins, the body’s own painkillers that can also trigger feelings of euphoria and well-being. But Dr Ross adds that having a tattoo is also psychologically rewarding. ‘you’ve put yourself in a situation where you have to deal with pain. ‘ There’s a sense of accomplishment that you’ve endured it. and tattoo artists have an incredible bedside manner. It’s a safe setting where you have psychological control.’ On a base level, we learn to crave this kind of stimulation and Dr Ross believes tattooing can hit this perfect sweet spot of pain and pleasure, meaning people go back for more. Beccy Rimmer, 29, an english graduate and digital marketing executive confesses she, too, finds her tattoo collection compulsive. Her first tattoo, nine years ago, was a tiny ‘ankh’, an egyptian cross, on her leg, to remind her of her mum. ‘She used to travel a lot when I was young and once brought me back a little ankh symbol necklace, which I never took off,’ she explains. Now Beccy’s arms and chest are decorated with an intricate web of tattoos.
‘I got addicted to the concept of marking my body with something meaningful, a line from a song, my nana’s favourite flower, a quote from a Shakespeare play — things that meant something to me,’ she says.
after she began writing about tattooing, her interest increased. Despite the revulsion some feel, Beccy argues tattoos can be works of art. ‘I was overwhelmed by how beautiful tattoos are in the 21st century,’ she says.
‘I started discovering amazing styles and artists. I just couldn’t stop getting tattooed and now have over 50 tattoos done by over 30 different artists.’
The attention a tattoo draws is also part of its appeal. Tattoos are well suited to the social media age: in a society when traditional bonds have frayed, where one’s neighbours can often be strangers and many complain of a sense of isolation, psychologists suggest tattoos give membership to a different sort of community.
‘Tattoos are both a way to stand within a group and assert your individuality,’ chartered clinical psychologist anita abrams says.
‘and when you’ve been through a big experience such as getting a tattoo, it’s natural to want to share it, to post pictures of what you’ve just had done. It’s a way to connect with others.’
For millennials more used to digital communication, tattoos can also be a way to ease day-today social interactions.
‘They’re able to text and send photos much more than their parents’ generation but they can’t look you in the eye,’ anita says.
‘ In real- life communication, tattoos may often attract approving facial expressions from strangers of a similar age. People may pay you more attention.
‘It’s more than just a conversation starter. If you get expressions from other people’s faces that say “I like that”, even with no verbal comment, that’s validation for a young person.’
Then, of course, there’s regret. While young men and women are proud to display tattoos on their young, wrinkle-free flesh, how will they feel when it starts to sag?
Beccy admits she’s constantly asked: what are you going to think of your tattoos when you’re older?
‘I hate this question,’ she says. ‘If I’m lucky enough to live that long, I’ll hopefully be reflecting on a life full of memories rather than worrying what I look like.
‘Tattoos mean many different things to different people. Some people get them because of the meanings, some like how the art looks, some want to look fashionable, and some are just getting tattooed because — why not?
‘Our bodies are temporary and getting tattooed embraces our impermanence.’
They’re brave words, but nevertheless, the British association of Dermatologists estimates a third of people with tattoos end up changing their minds, and statistics suggest that revenue from laser removal has increased as much as 440 per cent in the past decade.
Tracey Chatterley, 46, a drama school principal with a son and a daughter aged 13 and ten, would desperately love her tattoo lasered off — if only she could afford the £1,500 she’s been quoted.
She says she ‘utterly regrets’ the £40 design that has encircled her left bicep for 20 years.
‘I dread the summer,’ she says. ‘I am that woman who wears cardigans in the height of a heat wave.’
Tracey, from Bedfordshire, succumbed in her mid-20s because ‘it was the cool thing my girlfriends were doing’.
‘ I’d been going out with my husband Richard for six months,’ she recalls. ‘He tried to talk me out of it, saying I’d regret it. But I refused to listen.’
WHIleshe wanted an edgy barbed wire design, she was disappointed from the start when hers came out ‘more like a wavy line’. Then, in her early-30s Tracey realised she’d made a huge mistake.
‘I’d just had my children and the decades stretched out in front of me. The prospect of being a gran with a tattoo wasn’t cool, it was ridiculous.
‘To make matters worse my husband was working for a logistics company that held an annual summer ball, but I couldn’t contemplate wearing a strapless gown because I was so embarrassed about my ugly tattoo. Instead, I had to spend ages tracking down a ball gown with sleeves.
‘Today, my tattoo makes me feel incredibly self-conscious. The one good thing is that I suspect my children won’t ever get one. They’ve listened to me bitterly complain about mine so often.
‘If I could turn back the clock, I wish my husband and I had spent the money on a lovely lunch together instead.’
One only hopes the many people who get inked with those 1.5 million tattoos a year really know what they are doing.