Black and grey outline triangles on the ribs and a framed eye tattoo on the back of a hand, with a rose tattoo visible at the lower edge of the frame.

Outline triangles and framed eye tattoos

Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

A person lies on a bed in acid-wash denim shorts and a black lace bralette, with one hand resting over the torso. Two thin black outline triangles sit on the side of the ribs, and an ornate framed eye tattoo covers the back of the hand. A rose and some small lettering are partly visible at the bottom edge, all in black and grey ink against soft, neutral bedding.

Ribs Hand Triangle Eye Rose Lettering

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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

The sign for Hollis and Daughter has to be finished before the Saturday market, and Mr Hollis has already told the whole of Marlow Street that you are too slow. You work on an upturned crate in the back yard with the door propped open, a set square in your left hand and a number two brush in your right. Three triangles of gold leaf run along the fascia, each one a shade off from the last, because the light in the yard is never the same two mornings running.

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At half past eleven Miss Ada Pyke comes through the gate with a parcel in brown paper and a question she has been rehearsing since the bus. She wants a painted eye redone, the one above the door of the old picture framer's, which the council says must go. You tell her you do lettering, not eyes. She tells you the eye was yours, that you painted it at fourteen on a dare, and that it was the only thing on the high street that ever looked back at anyone.

You unwrap the parcel. Inside is a gilt frame with a square of card in it, and on the card, in pencil so faint you have to tilt it to the sun, is the eye, with a small rose tucked into the corner where the frame has worn through. Your hand knows the curve before your head does. You rule a triangle in the margin to steady your nerves, and then you begin.

By four the new fascia is up. Hollis walks the length of it and says nothing, which is his praise. Ada has gone. Beneath the eye on the card you have written, in careful capitals, the only words you can think of, and then you cross out the first one and leave the rest, because it is the truest thing you have painted all year.