And so I found myself once more trotting along to Chioko studios, Camden, holding my boyfriend's hand and rather a lot of shopping, with a girly friend walking closely behind. I love days like these – the clouds are grey and only just managing to hold back the rain (so much more character than hot, sweaty days) and a free afternoon from 6th form.
At A Glance Author Koops Contact emmawright@eu-infotech.com IAM koops When A week ago Artist Jose Studio Chioko Studios Location Camden, London (UK) So in we trot, to find the Mr Tattooist sitting on the stairs. He asks us what we want done ... "piercings" ... he points up the stairs, sighing, but still smiling. The place was very quiet: must have been a slow afternoon for him. Maybe next summer I'll go back and let him do my old-skool swallows? Anyway, we go upstairs and instead of finding the usual piercer, Cath, we find a tall guy with gorgeous 28mm lobe stretchings, 4 conch piercings and every available space of his cartilage, pierced. He asked what I wanted done, and I told him "my anti-tragus". With a rather blank look (I think I was talking rather fast and he was foreign, bless the doll) and a raised eyebrow from Jose (the piercer) acting as my queue, I pointed to the place on my ear I wanted pierced. He nodded – "Ah yes! Beautiful piercing on women. That ones gonna hurt though." Now, piercing pain doesn't usually bother me. It usually involves nothing more than a quick pinch that lasts for two seconds and then goes. But when a heavily modified tough guy is telling you how much this will hurt, you begin to wonder ...
I made several comparisons. Will this hurt more than the tragus? Than an upper cartilage piercing? "Yes – no comparison," was the answer to both. I took a step back, let my girl companion sort out her piercing, and thought whether I wanted my anti-tragus pierced, or whether I should get my anti-helix pierced instead. Lindsay (the friend) just wanted two more lobe piercings. Jose gave her the regular forms to fill in and took her into the piercing room. As always, it was hygienic and the only thing that unnerved me about it (and this gets me every time) would be the clown hanging from the far wall. Jose cleaned Lindsay's lobes, marked her piercings after the forms had been filled in, let her check the placement, and then quick as a flash pierced and inserted the straight bar jewellery, changing his gloves several times. The whole time he had said hardly anything, which was a little bizarre since we're used to chatty Cath who'll talk about everything and anything.
So, back to my piercing situation: ultimately, I thought – if I don't get it pierced now, I'll just build it up in my head making it worse and worse and never get it done. So just go for it. Jose laughed and told me he could tell I was brave to even ask for it ... thanks, Jose, mate ... that didn't make me feel too much better! But I laughed, filled out the forms, and went back into the piercing room. I glared at the hanging clown and hopped onto the ex-dentist's chair, wiggling my feet, which don't quite reach the end of the chair. Bless my small self. Jose cleaned my ear and marked two possible placements. One would have the bar tilting backwards, and one would see the bar tilting forwards (towards my head after it had gone through the cartilage). I decided to go for the latter option and Mr Jose changed gloves again.
By this time, I wanted Jose to talk. He had some amazing piercings and stretchings and I thought he looked like a person with many stories to tell. So me and the boyfriend started asking about his stretched conch piercings. I asked him whether he had stretched them or had a dermal punch ... "I had one punch, but that's not a good idea. It bleeds a lot. Too much hassle!" We began talking to him about scarification, which he performs on other people: "I think it's really beautiful, but very feminine. I wouldn't want it on myself." Implanting: "yes, I do that too. I love experimenting with different things. I hate having to do navel piercing after navel piercing. It's very dull, but that's the job," at this point, Lindsay subtly hides hers. "I'm waiting on some surgical glue so I won't need to use stitching, which can get a bit messy. I want to insert 6 silicon balls into my *points at crotch* so it feels nice for my partner when I go *thrusts hand backwards and forwards* boom, boom, boom." We could do nothing but laugh. Jose was talking like anything, so in comes Mr Tattooist to join the party.
We talked for a while longer about suspensions, surface piercings (Jose offered to do my surface tragus piercing and I'll definitely go to him when I decide to get it done), pocketing etc. and had a really amazing conversation with both Jose and Mr Tattooist. They are both genuinely fantastic guys. Possibly too fantastic. I'm slightly worried at the direction my boyfriend's sexual orientation is starting to swing to. Ho hum.
We also mentioned corset piercings. Jose's reply had me laughing to myself for quite a while ... "GRRR! I used to do them years ago! YEARS! In the 80s! And now they're in all the body modification magazines as this whole new thing! I was going it ages ago! So y'know what? FUCK THEM!" I asked if he'd do one for me some time in the future, and he smiled and of course, accepted.
Back to piercing. I sat back in the chair and Jose took the needle. He'd checked with me that I was happy with the size and let me choose whether I wanted a bar (straight or curved) or a ring. I definitely wanted a bar, because the ring I have in my lower cartilage is a royal pain the ass to clean. I was getting a bit nervous though and chose a straight bar, rather than a curved one, which I think looks prettier though. Never mind, I shall have it changed in the near future!
He crept up behind me and said, "right ... what I'll do in a minute is slide the needle in like this..." and in goes the needle. HA! I wasn't ready for that. The boyfriend and Lindsay whip out their camera phones and I hear camera clicks and giggles. Mr Tattooists laughs at my groans of protest to, "put those cameras away!" and Jose continues to pierce. It honestly didn't hurt. Jose had, had the good plan to build up the anticipation so the actual piercing wouldn't hurt too much. His plan of also going straight in with the piercing was also well received as I had told him earlier that I hate the usual method of "breathe in and out and we'll go on 3..." Jose doesn't use a clamp as he likes piercing freehand because "it's more intimate." I felt totally comfortable with this and think Jose is both a wonderful piercer and a wonderful person.
Inserting the jewellery was a little uncomfortable, but the worst part of the experience (apart from having pictures taken and that damn clown) was the sound of the cartilage being pierced. It was not as loud as my tragus piercing, but it was loud enough!
I was looking into the mirror for ages. The piercing is really gorgeous! It didn't bleed and only swelled and bruised slightly.
Lindsay and I paid (£20 for my anti-tragus) and were given after-care instructions. Before we left, Jose showed us the huge tattered, gothic wings he had, had tattooed on his back and the tattoo of his "baby" he had on his stomach. Both were beautiful and a lovely ending to a lovely afternoon of piercing. Jose told me to come back on a Wednesday or Friday afternoon for him to check any piercings I wanted checking or to get anymore piercings, surface piercings or play piercings I wanted. The guy really is amazing.
If you want this piercing, go for it. It's gorgeous and easy to handle and I really can't sell it any more than that!!