NEWS — Tattoo

Hey there, it’s V! I sometimes write the blog here at Studio 21, just reflecting on the year I’ve had since entering the world of “Tattoo Shop Life” as a gatekeeper. It has definitely been a very interesting year, full of exciting new experiences, meeting new people and seeing wonderful work done by all of the artists here at the shop!
Being around artistic individuals on a regular basis really inspires me to continue to create new things, and it is pretty awesome being in an environment where you are always learning something new.
As someone who comes from a family where I am the oldest, I didn’t realize all of my big brothers were going to show up in my life at a tattoo shop! That’s what it feels like working at Studio 21, from the dad jokes, fart jokes and nerf gun wars etc. They sure keep me on my toes! And I can’t forget about my other teammates Staysi and Ashley who are great people to work with, they are fun, reliable, intelligent individuals and together we make a pretty good team!
I think I can speak for everyone at the shop. We are thankful for the friendships we have created here, the connections we have made with people that extend beyond the shop.
We are thankful for each other and our clients especially, the new and old who give us purpose and something to strive for. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us!!!

-Written by Vanessa Torres

Dayum! Studio 21 Tattoo has  been havin’ a real good time with the Taco Tuesday events! If you havn’t heard about it already, you missed out. This idea came up pretty organically,  taking an age old tradition of eating delicious tacos on ..well.. TUESDAYS! Studio 21 decided to then combine Tattooing with the most amazing  food ever. Who doesn’t like this idea!? UH…NOBODY!! We decided to grill up some steak and chicken, make some fresh pico de gallo, salsas, corn tortillas and threw down some amazing street tacos mashed up with small tattoo designs related to our favorite food. “Taco Tattuesday” kicked off in the summer of  2016, offering $50 tattoos small “as is” designs with a couple FREE street tacos and a FREE beer even! On a hot summer desert day, June 21st marks the very first EVER Taco Tuesday event at a tattoo studio…I really believe that this WAS the first ever. We provided over 100+ small designs starting with a “taco” theme on this particular day, later evolving and adding themes such as “Desert”, and “Summertime”  tattoos with each fallowing summer month. June went pretty well! We kicked off the first event with 22 tattoos done in 3 hours of taco tattooing. Later in July we followed up with the “Summertime” themed tattoos and had another cookout unfortunately on the HOTTEST day ever with temperatures reaching 118 that day..this sucked. I was over the grill too..not cool. This wasn’t our most successful day, only doing 16 summer themed tattoos but whatever..we had fun. Too HOT for taco tatts. Quickly learning how to put this event together, we decided to get our shit together and really push the next event hard! August was the BEST “Taco Tattuesday” yet! We had a new fresh set of designs for the party, “Desert” themed. This idea got everyone really excited to make some great super appealing designs and the turnout showed. We did 48 tattoos in a little over 3 hours. Augusts event had ALL the sheets of designs from the whole summer, providing 300ish designs to choose from and had people stressed on which one to choose. Our last Taco night for the summer was a crazy success, leaving us tattooing till roughly 11pm. I had to leave the grill to help the guys finish off the line of people hungry for taco/summertime/desert tattoos! We originally planned on there only being 3 events total, one in June, one in July, and the same for August. Starting an anual Summer time exclusive event…but then we got a call. A call from a producer from a little magazine called VICE. If you know me, you know that I’m OBSESSED with VICE. So with that being said, they will be in town in September and asked if we would throw ONE LAST “Taco Tattuesday” for the summer…I said YES. If you missed this summers parties, this will be your last chance to get that little tattoo you procrastinated on all summer and is now the time to show up early on September 13th and get in line from 6-9pm to collect one of these limited designs!! Till next time guys. Thanks so much to all the collectors that came out and participated in Studio 21’s first ever summer of “Taco Tattuesday”!! You guys rock. Love you guys.

Austin Spencer

Studio 21 Tattoo Gallery

Artist/Owner

People ask me now and then if I ever do any professional athlete tattoos. To that I say, “yes, I do!”. Tattooing in Las Vegas affords us the opportunity to meet all kinds of interesting people from all over the world. You just never know who’s going to walk through that door.

A couple years ago, I had a young man come in and ask me to tattoo his children’s names on his chest. I said I’d be happy to. We agreed on a price and I went to work on getting the job done.

As he gets in my chair, I asked him what he does for a living. Something I frequently do to break the ice and get the conversation flowing. I remember he had a very strong accent. Wasn’t sure where he was from, but guessed he may be German. He very quietly tells me he plays futbol for a team in Amsterdam. I proceeded to tell him that I know nothing about sports. Pardon my ignorance, but I just don’t have time to keep up with sports. He smiled really big and said that it was all right. I could tell he liked not being recognized.

He explained to me that he played soccer. They just call it futbol over in Europe.

I had heard this before, so now we were clear on what sport he played. I still don’t know at this point that he is some what of a big deal over there.

He told me he was captain of his team in Amsterdam. Sounds like a real big deal to me now. Pretty cool! He was a very soft spoken guy who seemed a little timid.

I had a nice little visit with him while doing his tattoo. He told me he comes to Vegas with some friends for the World Series Of Poker. He didn’t play poker himself but just likes Vegas and enjoys to nice weather. Makes sense because I think the weather over in Holland is not so good much of the time.

Turns out his name is Ron Vlaar. He now plays for a team in England. He played with the Amsterdam team in the 2014 World Cup. I watched my first soccer game during the world cup just so I could see Ron do his job. He put on a great performance! I still don’t know a thing about soccer.  Whatever.

The studio has also had a couple visits from ice hockey defenseman, Deryk Engelland who at the time was playing for the Pittsburgh Penguins. Now he plays for the Calgary Flames. Phil luck got to tattoo him. Phil said he didn’t talk much. As the story goes, Phil asked him why the hell he would move from Canada to Pennsylvania to play hockey. Deryk told him he played for the Penguins. All of a sudden, this made much more sense to Phil.

We’ve had a number of visits from pro athletes, but I don’t remember the names.

Sorry. I’m just not a sports fan. Unless it’s fishing!!! Don’t get me started!!!

Chas. T. Spencer

Owner/Artist

Studio 21 Tattoo

Studio 21 Tattoo even does the popular tattoos daily! I’ve often pondered what causes tattoo trends. What makes people want to have the same tattoo that everybody else has? The most popular tattoos now are the infinity symbols. Nothing new about this symbol. It’s been around for an infinite number of years. I don’t know how long really. Google it!

More super popular tattoos would be the dandelion with birds flying out of it. The ladies just love this one! Many of them find their ideas for tattoos on Pinterest. Imagine wanting something original and clever and finding it on Pinterest.

Remember tattoo flash? If you don’t, I’ll give you a little info on the subject. You may have seen pictures of old tattoo shops with all these sheets of art on the wall. You just walked in and looked around at all these little tattoo pictures which usually had the price next to them. This was a brilliant idea. It made decisions easy for people who wanted a tattoo, but just couldn’t decide what they wanted. These flash sheets were usually prepared by an experienced tattoo artist who knew what was involved in the tattoo process. These guys knew how to design images that were easily applied to the skin and would last a very long time.

Fast forward to today. The customer walks in the studio with a “smart phone” in their hand, shows a very skilled artist a very bad picture of something they found on the internet. These are the same folks who would tell you they don’t want just any tattoo off the wall. This brings me back to Pinterest. This is the largest wall ever!

One thing I have learned over the years is, these trendy tattoos are the ones we cover up in a few years. Fortunately, the infinity symbol is going to be fairly easy to hide as soon as they figure out they have the same tattoo as everyone else in town.

What I am trying to say is, if you seek out the best tattoo artist in Las Vegas, try to let the artist help you come up with an image that is not so trendy. That way, you won’t be looking for a cover up tattoo in five years.

Chas. T. Spencer @21tat – Owner/ Artist, Studio 21 Tattoo

No Christmas didn’t happen in the middle of the summer….we just started BRAINSTORMING the 2014 Studio 21 X-Mas Party! SO EXCITED!! I’m pretty sure were goin’ with a “GANSTER-ISH” theme this year. Gonna be amazing. One thing is for sure…we at STUDIO 21 TATTOO get down when it comes to parties!! Last year was pretty rad. Limo busses, kereoke, grub, booze, and some wasted sledding…hmnnn and some table dancing and a broken couch and some knives and some paintings as gifts…..and thats around the time I BLACKED OUT..just sayin’. CAN’T WAIT!