Browsing around BME one finds a lot of things and ideas which one may not usually come across by oneself. I am one of these people too, the idea or thing which I found? Lip sewing. People get their lips sewn for so many reasons; spiritual reasons, rite of passage, public performance, personal testing and the list goes on. We all have our own reasons, and for me? I thought they look cool, and wanted some photos and video of myself with my lips sewn together. And good it did look.
At A Glance Author Kus Contact Kus@bme.anon When Six months ago Artist Ped Now that we have that out of the way, lets head over to the story. I had spoken to Ped at Lazy Dragon piercing studio for a while about the idea of lip sewing and the more important things in the practice such as materials to use and techniques and designs to use in the process.
Discussions of materials went on for a long time finding pros and cons of a number of materials. Fishing wire was decided had a great amount of potential as it presented a nylon based material which had a slight amount of elasticity and malleability. However we were unable to find suitable material in time for the "event". We were presented with mainly very thin yet expensive line, usually in light colours, which we did not want. We wanted something which would show up and something which was not too thin as it could have easily cut and / or ripped through my lips.
Ptfe was considered next as it too was a (slightly less) malleable, nylon based material, guaranteed to be safe as it is widely used in the piercing profession. However we found that we had no way of tying off the ends after the lip sewing would have been completed as the material did not bend enough. We did not want to use balls to close the ends like a barbell, although thinking back on it now, this idea wasn't considered by us either.
Finally we decided to use cotton. Maybe not the safest material to put through ones body, but it was strong, very flexible, and available in all the colours under the sun. In the end however the safety factor was over ridden anyway because I was not left with any problems by the cotton, even though due to its nature we were unable to sterilise it, as a sterilising solution or autoclave would have softened and un-done the strands of the cotton.
The actual day of the lip sewing had been decided and went ahead a good three months after the first plans went ahead. Everything should have been perfect on this night considering how long we had planned it for, but no this was not to be the case.
The day was the last day of spring term at school, and I made my way straight to Dover train station to meet my girlfriend coming down from college to join in the action. Next stop, the knitting shop opposite the piercing studio to buy the smoothest line of black cotton we could find. With this task complete it was now time to go ahead and go to the studio.
It was still an hour before the shop would be ready to shut for the night so we waited a while and then accompanied Ped and the rest of the gang to Prince Albert (the very appropriately named pub opposite the piercing studio), for a quick drink each. We headed up to Glens house (tonight's venue) a further hour or so later with a late start coming not until roughly seven pm, after a few more gulps of Lambrini and the odd joint.
We all still had faith in Peds sobriety at this point and went ahead with getting started. Marks were put around my lips for the ten point lip sewing, made up of four points on each lip and the other two points (the first and last hole) being marked on the cheeks. Then the first needles went in. We worked along the top lip first from left to right. The first two piercings were to be the most painful of the night. These were a new experience as I had never had an upper lip piercing done before.
The latter piercings then became increasingly less painful with the bottom lip being traversed from right to left next. Finally Ped pierced the two cheek holes, these being a further new experience to both myself and Ped.
At this point there were five other people present, doing a variety of tasks, most revolving smoking and drinking. All of these people however had one thing in common; a shared intrigue and worry about what was happening before their eyes. All of them came for this but none had quite expected to see me with the tubes of ten IV needles through my lips and cheeks.
After each piercing had now been completed and all the IV needle sleeves had been left in place they were cut down to a more manageable size, to make it easier for Ped to work, and for me to attempt a sip of water, which at first went well until I finished and tried to swallow the last bit. It ended up on the floor.
Now came the tricky part of the evening, the threading of the cotton. It was decided after about ten minutes of trying, that the thread was too thick and had to be parted to half its length, which made it a bit less troublesome but still didn't make it a picnic. It was another five minutes before the thread was in the first sleeve. This sleeve was then pulled out from the outside to the inside of the cheek carefully, pulling the thread with it.
I had expected the sensation of thread being pulled through a hole in my cheek to be a somewhat uncomfortable, rough one. However this was not to be the case as it actually turned out to be rather pleasant.
The above procedure was repeated a number of times, at an increased rate to get my lips laced up slowly but surely. It surprisingly took until the third needle had been pulled out for there to be any blood to be seen. But when this blood made its first appearance it didn't want to go away. This wasn't a major problem for myself as it wasn't a huge amount, and on the photos and the video it gave a very much needed and wanted dramatic effect, however for Ped it made his job much more difficult.
As blood ran down the string and made bubbles with my saliva between the pieces of thread, Ped got lost in the muddle of needle sleeves and thread, at one point accidentally cutting one piece of string. This sadly changed the design a bit from a ten point to a nine point design. I was asked if I wanted to re-pierce that hole to save the design, but even though the piercings weren't too painful my lips had now started to get very swollen and slightly sore from the cotton running through the holes and being pulled and pushed constantly.
With the ninth hole being threaded I got a phone call from fellow BME / Iam member scaredycat a.k.a. (in real life) Mike. To everyone's surprise I was still able to talk relatively well, with only the odd words being slurred due to an in ability to open my mouth fully, and to my surprise noticed that Ped had been able to thread the last hole, which had taken a good ten minutes.
Ped being in a slight hurry told me to finish the conversation to allow him to close up my mouth which he did, pulling the thread tight enough to shut my mouth, but allow just enough space for me to be able to drink if I had to. The finishing touches were made by tying up the two ends with a couple of knots, and then cleaning my mouth with saline solution to get rid of the large amounts of dried blood covering the lower area of my face.
The feeling of the thread sitting in my lips tightly enough to restrict my speech a little, but remind me that my mouth was to be kept shut, was a liberating one. No one expected me to say anything or asked me for anything for that small time I was dumb. It was only kept in for a period of about half an hour, after which the thread was cut, the stitches taken out and I left the house shortly after as if nothing had happened.
It was only about five minutes after having been fully sewn up that I felt the slightest bit ill from the experience and had been a little pale during the whole thing, but was overall able to complete my experience in good health and state of mind. The next few days after that I felt great, I was surprisingly happy and active and couldn't stop thinking about the lip sewing for a while. The experience had given me a great high, especially when an hour after having it done, while waiting for my train I suddenly thought; "I just after all this planning had my lips sewn together, against what everyone thought of me for doing this I got it done."
It felt great knowing I had done this for me and only me. Sure the spectators benefited from it in some way, with half of them feeling ill and faint during most of it, but I did it for myself, I proved to myself that I could have things done even if they pushed the barriers of what you might want to call our cultural norm (namely that norm which says you shouldn't get your lips sewn together). I'm still looking forward to my next lip sewing, and in the slightly more distant future to take it a step further. I've opened myself to the world of body rituals, please oh please bring on the suspension.
However I would like to end this by suggesting one thing to anyone thinking about getting a lip sewing done. The material which was used for carrying out the piercings had been sterilised, however the cotton had not. I would suggest other materials to be used for threading, I know I will next time. Finally try to carry it out in a sterile environment, such as a piercing studio, not like me in a friends living room. But what ever you do, make sure you do it safely and have fun with it at the same time.