Colour Neo-trad tattoo of pink roses, an orange marigold and green leaves on a vine across an upper arm.

Rose and marigold vine on upper arm

Neo-trad · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A raised arm shows a colour tattoo of two pink roses and an orange-yellow marigold, with green leaves and brown stems running diagonally toward the elbow. A thin black scroll line sits among the stems, and the bold outlines and saturated fills give the piece a traditional look. The plain white door behind the arm keeps the focus on the artwork, with a black vest top and the wearer's neck and chest visible at the right edge.

Neo-trad Botanical Upper arm Rose Flower Leaves Vine Stem Scroll

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 paint tin is already open on the cabin roof when the lock gates begin their groan below you, and Ada Pollard, who has been painting boats on the Oxford Canal since before you were born, tells you to stop watching the water and start watching the rose. You have been at it since seven. Two pink roses are almost right. The leaves are not. Her rule is that a rose is never painted alone. It always has a stem running off the edge of the work, as if it has somewhere better to be.

Keep reading

She does the marigolds herself, three quick strokes of ochre and orange, the petals loose and a little careless, because marigolds, she says, are the only flowers that don't mind being rushed. You lay in the vine with a fine liner and a green so dark it looks black in the shade of the awning. It curls down the side of the cabin toward the stern, through the gap where the name should go. The scroll is her idea. Every boat gets a line of black curl somewhere among the stems, a space left for the owner's name, to be lettered in once the paint has dried and the family has decided what they want to be called.

Her hands have started to shake this spring, so she hands you the liner and sits on an upturned bucket with her tea going cold. You ask her what the scroll should say. She shrugs at the canal. The best boats, she says, are the ones still waiting for their names.

That evening the boat slides out of the lock with the paint still tacky, and you walk the towpath beside her, watching the marigolds catch the last of the sun. Ada raises a rag from the bank. Past the bridge the scroll is still blank, and you understand that leaving it empty was the point.