Black and grey realism tattoo of a pocket watch with Roman numerals and a shaded rose on a forearm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Pocket watch and rose on a forearm

Realism · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A black and grey pocket watch with Roman numeral markings and an exposed movement sits above a shaded rose with beads at the base. The linework is crisp, and the shading builds soft greys across the petals and watch face. The tattoo fills the forearm, with a sunburst pattern and additional Roman numerals at the top of the frame, set against a plain paper backdrop.

Realism Forearm Pocket watch Clock Roman numeral Rose Bead Sunburst

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

The clock in the hall of Seacombe House has stood at twenty to four since the spring of 1994, when Mrs Pruett's husband wound it for the last time and never set it going again. On Sunday mornings you are given a soft brush and a tin of metal polish and told to clean the dial, but never to open the back. Your fingers still smell of brass when the guests come down for breakfast.

Keep reading

Mrs Pruett keeps his pocket watch in the drawer of the hall table, its chain coiled like something asleep. On the first warm Saturday in June she lays it in your palm and tells you it has been ticking in the dark for three days. Its hands move in small, decided jerks. She says the movement is held together by a sliver of brass and a great deal of stubbornness, and that you should not ask her which of the two matters more.

Behind the house a lane runs down to the sea, and beside the back step a rose has grown over the coal bunker, heavy with petals the grey of pencil shading. Each morning she cuts one and leaves it on the kitchen sill beside a string of wooden beads she counts when she cannot sleep. Nobody has ever asked her why she counts them.

On the last night of the season you wind the watch yourself, very gently, and set it on the sill beside the rose. By morning the hands have crept round to ten past eight, and the hall clock, for the first time since 1994, is ticking. Mrs Pruett says nothing. She simply fills the kettle and reaches for two cups.