Kate’s relationship with tattoos is a family affair.
Three of her four pieces were inked by her aunt, Katie Davis, owner of Salvation Gallery in Richmond, who taught Kate early on that the significance of her tattoos was important. Kate got her first at age eighteen, an anchor and dogwood on the back of her shoulder in remembrance of another family connection.
“The one on my shoulder is for both my great-grandmothers,” she told me the day I photographed her tattoos. “One is named Virginia, so the dogwood, and the other one was in the Navy. She was nurse. I love it, but as I’ve gotten older I don’t love that it’s a flower and an anchor because I feel like every girl gets some form of a flower and an anchor, usually on their foot. But it’s less girly-looking which helps. I still love it as my first tattoo.”
Having a world-class tattooist in the family is a boon for anyone wanting to collect some ink, but as Kate has gotten older, she’s found herself wanting to explore other avenues. “For a while I was really boxed in to like, I’m only gonna get tattoos by her, because I really like her style, but she’s always insanely busy,” she said. “And, I don’t know, I like tattoos and I would get them more if like, it’s not like a rush thing to me if that makes sense. It was similar for me when I decided I don’t want kids, I don’t need to get married, it kind of slowed down my need of finding a partner. It was similar, I don’t need to fill my whole body with tattoos all at once.”
“She always told me that meaning is really important, but as I’ve gotten older, I don’t hate the idea of having something just because I like it. She hammered that into me a lot when I was younger, but I think it was just because she didn’t want me as an eighteen-year-old getting something stupid. Which makes sense. As I’m now not eighteen, I’m thinking of branching out and getting just fun things. It doesn’t necessarily have to have some important meaning behind it.”
The one tattoo Kate currently has that was not done by her aunt is also the only one that does not have direct personal meaning to her. In fact, she often forgets it’s there. “I did this one during Covid. He [the tattooist] was doing it for charity,” she told me of the sketched figure inside her left arm. “It was like $100, or maybe $150, and I think like $50 went to him and $50 went to an organization that he chose for trans youth. I really like it, and I always forget about it.”
Further down her arm is a collection of symbols that at first reminded me of a crystal ball. “It is my birth sign, star sign, and that is the glyph sign of Saturn, which is what Capricorns are ruled by,” she told me of the constellation rising from a yellow camellia, a winter-blooming flower also associated with her birth season.
Kate’s largest piece, on her right thigh, serves as a reminder of home. “I am from Maine, and this is just a big hot spot from where I’m from, it’s the Wiggly Bridge. And then blueberries obviously. They’re known for wild blueberries. They’re a little bit different than normal blueberries, they’re teeny-tiny. Chickadee is the state bird. And then goldenrod is pretty big up there as well.”
Though Kate’s lifelong accumulation of tattoos will be gradual, she already has plans for what’s next. “I really want to get one for my grandfather. He passed away, it’ll be five years this year I think. And he was just a riot. My sister, myself, my mom, my aunts, we all want to get something, not the same thing. We’ve all just been trying to think of what we got the most out of his relationship personally. My sister got his truck, but also her favorite things from him, like he always had pocket watches and pocketknives, and he used to have a motorcycle. He was just kind of rough and tumble, so that’s what she is pulling on. And he was really big into fishing, and food. Big on travel. All that sort of stuff. So it’s just been hard to try to find the perfect way to encompass a little bit of all of that into a picture format.”
I imagine one of those aunts might be the one to put it on her.
This post is part of my ongoing series documenting people’s tattoos and their stories. Thank you for reading, you’re beautiful.