Black and grey tattoo of scissors, a thread spool, needles and a thimble on the side of the ribs, drawn in fine detailed linework.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Sewing tools tattoo on the ribs

Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

The tattoo shows a cluster of sewing tools, including open scissors, a wound thread spool, pins and needles, a thimble and loops of chain, arranged diagonally across the skin. It is rendered in black and grey with fine linework and layered shading that gives the metal and thread a three-dimensional look. The design wraps down the side of the ribcage and fills the space beneath the breast.

Ribs Scissors Thread Spool Needle Pin Sewing Chain

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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 rain had found the gap in our awning by nine o'clock, so the wool bolts along the front of Pelham Street market had gone dark and heavy, and I spent the morning wiping the blades of Auntie Ruth's shears on my apron. She would not let me use the good pair. Those lived in a tin lined with flannel, and they had a way of going blunt if a stranger breathed on them.

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Ruth sat on her upturned crate with a spool in her lap, winding grey thread around a card so slowly it looked like prayer. Chain hung from the hook above her, the old dressmakers' chain that once held her mother's measuring tape, now looped with keys nobody had come back for. Every few minutes a customer shook out an umbrella under the awning and asked whether we did alterations on coats. Ruth always said yes, then named a price that made them laugh and pay anyway.

On the third Saturday in March a man came with a wedding suit wrapped in a bin bag. He wanted the left sleeve let out an inch, because his brother had grown and he had not. Ruth studied the stitching for a long time, then looked at me. "Go on," she said. "Your hands are steadier than mine now." I took the thimble from the tin, pushed it onto my middle finger, and felt the cold of it bite through my glove.

The thread slipped, the needle bent, and I laughed in a way that made the man laugh too. When I finally finished, the sleeve hung right. Ruth nodded once and went back to her winding, and I understood that the spool in her lap had never really been for her, but for whoever would take it when she stopped. The rain kept falling, and I kept the good shears dry.