Black ink flash design of a butterfly with ornamental swirling wings and long curled antennae, shown without any body placement.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Ornamental swirl butterfly design

Blackwork · Black and grey · Flash

A symmetrical butterfly drawn in solid black linework, with its body and antennae at the centre and curling scrolls filling both wings. The wings are built from tapering swirls, dots and fine teardrop shapes, with the outer edges finished in large spirals. The image is a plain white background with no shading or colour.

Blackwork Butterfly Swirl Antennae Ornamental Wing Scrollwork

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Hetty, the lace came back from the mender with the left wing torn clean through, so I have spent two nights unpicking scrolls by lamplight to find where the thread wants to go. You were right about the pattern. Mirror every curl or it looks lopsided, Mrs Ashdown said, and she was not wrong, though she said it while eating my shortbread.

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The bride drew the butterfly herself on the back of a seed packet, all tapering feelers curling up like young ferns and spirals finishing each wing edge. The drawing shows where the dots go but not how large they should be, so I have made them the size of a lentil at the wing tips and smaller toward the body. The little teardrops down the thorax took me a whole afternoon. My eyes ache from the black silk, and my fingers are full of pricks.

The mother-in-law wanted something plainer, a single pale stitch round the hem, nothing that might catch on a train. I told her the butterfly would not catch on anything, because I had backstitched every swirl twice. She sniffed and said nothing more, which from her is a blessing.

On the day, I stood at the back of the chapel where I could not be seen. Nobody looked at the hem during the vows. They looked at her face, as they should. But when she lifted the skirt to climb the step, the light from the high window caught both wings at the same angle, and I thought, there, that is what symmetry is for. Write to me and tell me the Ashdown boy has finally stopped sending you poems.