Teal mandala tattoo with layered petals and a central spiral across a person's upper back, with dark braided hair falling over one shoulder.

Teal mandala on upper back

Geometric · Back · Colour · Photo

A large mandala tattoo in teal ink covers the upper back, built from layered lotus-like petals around a central spiral. The linework is fine and even, with dotted and scalloped detailing inside the petals and rings, and the shading is light, leaving the design mostly outlined. The composition is centred and symmetrical, with a thin chain necklace and dark braided hair framing the top and left of the image.

Geometric Botanical Back Mandala Lotus Flower Spiral Pattern

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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

Hush now, and keep your boots out of the sawdust, because this is the last of the big top at Scarrow Sands and it has more holes than my good stockings. No, the tent isn't on fire. That's only the sunset coming through the canvas, same as every evening since the bank took the lights.

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Above the ring hung a rosette the colour of a kingfisher's back, a lotus of teal cloth with petals stacked upon petals and a spiral at its heart like a sleeping snake's coil. Ivy Marsh stitched it in the wardrobe tent from the shirts of men who had died or run off, one scallop at a time, and every winter she added another ring because the tent kept shrinking around it. Lucan Vey, the ringmaster, wanted it cut down for the scrap men. He said a circus needed lights, not lace, and Ivy told him the spiral was the only part of the show that had ever gone round properly.

The night the last crowd came, the trapeze rope snapped at the spiral's heart and the whole rosette began to unwind. Ivy did not cry out. She climbed the ladder with her scissors in her teeth and cut the stitching one loop at a time, and the cloth came down like a slow tide over the empty seats. The people stood up. They did not run. They tipped their heads back and saw the sky pricked through in a dozen petals, and nobody thought to ask for their money back.

Now, Tommy, if you're still awake, go and count the stars through the holes. Ivy always said there were more of them than there were seats.