Black and grey tattoo on an upper arm of three overlapping faceless figures in suits and ties, with a diamond-patterned jacket, in a blackwork and geometric style.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Three stacked suited figures on upper arm

Blackwork · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

The tattoo shows three overlapping, faceless male busts in suits and ties, stacked one behind another so each figure fades back in outline. The hair is styled with curved, hatched volume, and the front jacket has a diamond cross-hatched pattern. Bold black outlines and fine hatching create the shading, and the piece is entirely black and grey on a fleshy arm against a dark sleeve and red-carpeted background.

Blackwork Geometric Upper arm Man Suit Tie Portrait Figure Hair Jacket

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

Mr Okonedo had the cutting room to himself after six, which was when Ada Pell liked to pin the day's measurements to the board. The order slip on the nail said three jackets, one for each of the Vance brothers, and a note underneath in a hand she knew: all to be cut from the same bolt of Glen check, the eldest first, the youngest last, and no one is to see the others fitted.

Keep reading

She cut the eldest from the front of the bolt, where the diamonds ran clean and tight, and she sewed him a lapel wide enough to argue with. The middle brother's jacket came from the offcut, so the pattern shrank by a diamond at every seam. By the time she reached the youngest she had only the selvedge left, and she worked it with a fine chalk line and a steady hand, because the boy had asked for something he could wear into the sea.

The brothers came for their fittings on the same grey Thursday. The eldest stood on the box and looked at the glass without blinking. Ada watched the second one slide into the frame behind him, then the third, each a little smaller, each with his face turned away, as if they were waiting for a train that had been cancelled. Nobody had told them that the mirror only had room for three.

When the last jacket was pressed, she folded them one inside another, the largest outermost, and tied them with tape. Only the youngest's hem still had its basting, a row of loose white stitches she had not yet pulled out. She left it that way on purpose.