Ink the arms with boughs of holly: Christmas tattoos in N.S. tap into holiday nostalgia
Well, he’ll know if she’s been naughty or nice, that’s for sure.
It was a rare request, but Becky Matheson at Wanderlust Tattoos in Halifax was up for the challenge: the customer wanted Santa Claus inked permanently on her thigh.
“One of my good, long-term clients has a vintage Santa Claus that I did, an old snowman and a woodstove through a snowy window scene,” Matheson said in a recent interview.
“I have the stencil of the Santa up on my wall in my studio and everybody comments on it all the time.”
‘Coziness of being a kid’
The nostalgia factor plays into it, said the tattoo artist.
“A lot of that stuff reminds us of our grandparents,” Matheson said of the Santa, the snowman and the woodstove tattoos.
“You feel that coziness of being a kid again.”
Matheson was keen on capturing the idea in ink for her customer.
“And I love the vintage kind of vibe of it, too,” she said.
“Normally, when people talk about holiday tattoos, I’d say Halloween is probably the biggest one. There’s always spooky flash. It has a lot more of the themes that we go for with tattoos anyway – some of the darker stuff. So, Christmas tattoos definitely aren’t as popular as Halloween ones. But it doesn’t mean that people don’t get them.”
‘Chunky’ bulbs
The client dropped into Matheson’s studio in early December.
“She just loves Christmas,” Matheson said.
“And we were talking about it because she wants to add some of the old C9 Christmas bulbs that we all had in the ‘90s – the big, chunky ones that don’t have the LED or anything.”
The client wanted to be able to tap into the happiness and joy of Christmas whenever she felt like it, said the artist.
“And she doesn’t have to wait until Christmas season each year. She just says she can look at her tattoo and enjoy it year-round.”
This isn’t Matheson’s first time working with a Christmas theme.
‘Very subtle’
“I’ve done lots of holly that people will get either for birth flowers for December, or just like a very subtle Christmas tattoo – they’ll just get some holly with red berries,” Matheson said.
“It’s not literally: here’s Santa Claus in your face.”
She’s also tattooed a gingerbread man in a teacup with a candy cane.
“We did a Halloween teacup, and then he was like, ‘You know what, I want to match this and do a Christmas teacup.’”
Matheson’s work mostly focuses on florals and animals.
“With my stencils on the wall, they all comment, ‘Oh my God, I love that someone got Santa,” she said. “I wouldn’t get it. But I love that someone else got it. It makes them happy to see it.”
‘High demand’
While they aren’t as common as anchors and Celtic crosses, Christmas does play a role in the tattoo artist’s bottom line.
“There’s always a high demand for gift certificates starting in November,” Matheson said.
Sometimes it’s as simple as stuffing some cash into an envelope for a friend or relative and saying: “this is to go towards your tattoo,” she said.
People will also buy their own tattoos at this time of year as a gift to themselves, Matheson said.
‘Crazy time’
“This is definitely one of those times where we’re not thinking selfishly and we’re thinking of other people. But sometimes people just need to do something for themselves, year-round really. So, a lot of people will be like, you know what? This is my Christmas present to myself … because it’s such a crazy time of year. So, it’s kind of nice to have that.”
Matheson’s studio is near the corner of North and Agricola streets, a neighbourhood where tattoo shops now abound.
“It’s insane,” Matheson said of the conglomeration.
“My clients will go, ‘Oh, I got tattooed right around the corner at this place.’ And I’m like, I can’t even keep up anymore. It’s crazy.”
‘Full coloured Grinch’
Just down Agricola at the 902 Tattoo Collaborative, apprentice artist Brandon Dominix said they’re working on a bunch of flash pieces – designs on paper that are ready to be tattooed immediately – with holiday themes.
“We’ve already done a lady who came in and got a full-coloured Grinch tattooed on her wrist,” Dominix said.
“The Grinch was a pretty funny one. It was a customer we’ve had quite a few times now. So, it was definitely a little bit of a shock, because she definitely does not like the holidays. So, I think that’s kind of why she got the Grinch, as a kind of play on that.”
‘Kind of timeless’
Little Santa hats, jingle bells and snowflakes are also popular, he said.
“A lot of people will get a poinsettia without the colour because it’s like a floral piece that’s kind of timeless,” Dominix said.
“It’s kind of more like the evangelical folks that really take Christmas seriously. So, it’s usually that, or somebody has a fond memory about a certain type of Santa hat, or a nativity scene kind of thing.”
One of Alicia Simms’ clients at Millbrook’s Rolling Sea Tattooery got characters from the 1964 animated television special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer inked on her calf in the fall of 2020, even though Christmas was months away.
‘Happy chord’
“I guarantee when people see it, it definitely strikes a happy chord,” Simms said.
“I think that’s the biggest transformation in tattooing over the last couple of decades. It went from … I don’t want to say scary subject matter, but I guess maybe less than savoury or mainstream, into like works of art and happy memories.”
It portrayed “Rudolph and that elf with the string of Christmas lights that say ‘Misfit,’” Simms said of the tattoo. “It was pretty fun. She loves that movie and it always brings her joy to think about these misfit island toys, so it was something that she wanted to commemorate.”
A tattoo artist for more than 16 years, she didn’t have any reservations about giving the seasonal tattoo.
‘Core childhood memory’
“There is definitely stuff that comes up where you think you might want to caution someone,” Simms said. “But this one I absolutely didn’t. It was like a core, childhood memory and the idea behind it was great. So, I didn’t hesitate on that at all; I thought it was fantastic.”
On the flip side, giving “tattoos for Christmas is a huge thing,” she said.
“Usually, it’s a gift certificate,” Simms said.
With rates starting at $200 an hour, “it’s nice that people can give you something that goes towards that payment,” she said. “Last year we had one in particular where two or three different people came in and bought gift certificates for the same person and it was like a cousin and a grandmother and an aunt.”
‘Super stoked’
The female client was “super-stoked when they came in and their tattoo was pretty much paid for,” Simms said.
Other times, people surreptitiously pay for their loved one’s ink.
“It’s always something like, ‘Am I allowed to tell them who it was? Or is it a mystery?” Simms said. “Sometimes it’s a mystery; they don’t want people to know who paid it.”
Lest you think giving and getting tattoos at Christmas is a new thing, rest assured it is not.
‘Best time’
“I can’t speak on the Christmas tattoo theme in depth, it’s not something I have encountered much of,” said Jamie Jelinski, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto’s Department of Art History, who researches and teaches about tattoos.
“What I can say … is that one Ontario tattooer was advertising ‘tattoos for Christmas’ via the press in the early 1960s. Beyond that, and at a more general level, as far back as 1909, another Canadian tattooer was adverting that the cold weather of winter (from early December onward) was the ‘best time’ to get tattooed,” said Jelinski, who has also taught Global Tattoo Histories at NSCAD University in Halifax.
“This was likely somewhat of a marketing gimmick to drum up clientele during the slow season, but there is a level of truth to it — the healing tattoo is not exposed to the elements in the same way during the winter months.”
