I Help Pet Parents Keep Their Furbabies With Them Forever By Creating A Tiny Tattoo

I'm a single needle tattoo artist located in Toronto at Golden Iron Tattoo Studio.

I've always enjoyed art but I never imagined I would be tattooing. To be honest, I think it started as a joke between friends who appreciated my artwork that I'd post on social media. I remember it just seemed so impossible and intimidating at the time. Once I finally mustered up the courage to find an apprenticeship I completely fell in love with the art of tattooing.

I've now been tattooing for a little over a year. Learning how to tattoo was one of the hardest things I've ever done though. Like really, really hard. Luckily I had an amazing group of talented peers to learn from at Golden Iron. The whole process has definitely helped me become more patient and committed. Before tattooing I would abandon a lot of personal art projects and well, yeah - you just can't with tattooing. I don't think people would like that mid-tattoo haha. It's certainly not always an easy job but I'm incredibly grateful to be able to do what I do.

I try not to limit myself to one specific style but I have a special place in my heart for these micro pet portraits - mainly because they tend to be so sentimental. Not going to lie, I get a little watery eyed sometimes when someone has come in for a tattoo of a pet who's passed away. But it's a really amazing feeling to get to provide something like this for a client who loved their animal so much.

For tattoos like the micro pups, the whole process from meeting with my client, creating and placing the stencil, and actual tattoo time takes around 2 hours. I've been incredibly lucky to have a ton of amazing clients who make that time a lot of fun.

My plans for the future are to keep challenging myself and travel more over 2017 - I'm already planning a trip to St. Petersburg, Russia at Sasha Tattooing Studio for May so I'm super excited for that. I will also be moving to a private space in Toronto under the talented Fabrizio Divari in December and can't wait to learn more from him. It's really important to me that I never get too comfortable, and keep pushing myself to learn new skills.

More info: Instagram