Realism black and grey tattoo on a lower leg showing a Roman numeral clock with exposed gears, a dollar sign and rolled banknotes, shown from three angles.

Clock, dollar sign and banknotes on a calf

Realism · Other · Black and grey · Photo

A three-panel photo of a lower leg tattoo showing a pocket watch with Roman numerals and exposed gears, a large dollar sign, and rolled banknotes. The shading is smooth and highly detailed, with strong contrast, soft highlights and a dark, sculpted background that gives a three-dimensional effect. The image is mostly grey and black ink, with muted pinkish tones in the clock face and skin, and the three views are arranged side by side.

Realism Other Clock Pocket watch Gear Roman numeral Dollar sign Banknote Money

Find an artist for this

Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Mr Okonedo had kept the repair shop on Bell Street for thirty-one years, and he never let a customer watch him open a case. "Gears want privacy," he said, the way other men said grace. So when Ruth Pilling set a silver pocket watch on the glass counter and asked what it would cost to make it run again, he turned it over twice before he answered, and the balance wheel under his loupe stood perfectly still.

Keep reading

"Three hundred," he said. "Cash, if you please."

She counted out the notes from a purse that had been mended more than once, rolling each hundred tight the way her late husband had taught her, and laid them in a small pile beside the dial. The shop clock behind her ran a full second slow, the only thing on Bell Street that had ever been wrong about the time.

He found the fault in the fourth jewel, a hairline crack that had waited years for someone to look. He worked until the desk lamp was the only light in the room, and when the watch finally took up its small, stubborn heartbeat, he held it to her ear like a doctor. Ruth listened, smiled, and pushed the rolled notes back across the counter.

"Keep the money," she said. "Wind it for me on Sundays and tell me the time." Okonedo nodded, and after she had gone he sat with the watch in his palm, counting seconds against the slow clock, until the tall lamp clicked off and the room was dark.