Watercolour-style rose tattoo on the forearm, with red petals, green leaves, black linework and a trailing stem.

Watercolour rose on a forearm

Botanical · Forearm · Mixed · Photo

A loose rose bloom sits on the forearm, drawn with fine black linework and partly filled with black shading at its centre. Red and green washes spread beyond the outlines, and a thin stem with green leaves trails down towards the wrist. The bloom is placed near the elbow end of the arm against a plain dark background.

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 band at the Lantern Ballroom had been playing the same waltz since eight, and Ruth had counted the bar stools twice before I found her by the cloakroom hatch with a bucket of roses that had seen better evenings. 'Last of the Saturday stock,' she said, and pushed one at me. Its head was heavy and red, the petals already loosening at the edges like wet paper.

Keep reading

Harold asked me to dance at ten past eleven. He had a stiff collar and a bad left knee, and he steered me round the floor as if the boards were ice. I held the rose between my teeth on the turn because I had no hand free, and he laughed so hard he missed the step. When we came round again the stem had snapped below the head, a green thread still hanging from it, and a smear of red had crossed the floor behind us like someone had dragged a wet brush.

Afterwards I found the bloom on the cloakroom counter, its centre gone dark where the dust from the boards had settled into it. I should have thrown it out. Instead I tucked the broken stem into my coat, its leaves still tacky with cheap varnish, and carried it home past the shuttered chip shop and the bus shelter with its cracked glass.

The next Saturday Harold was waiting by the hatch with another rose, a proper one this time, long-stemmed and tightly furled. 'Ruth said you'd want the full set,' he said. I took it. The first one I pressed flat in my hymn book, where the red had bled through two pages and left them looking dipped in the same sunset as the dance floor.

More like this

Botanical tattoo of a sprig with red and pink flowers, black leaves and small dots on the upper arm.
Red flower sprig on an upper arm
Black and grey botanical tattoo of a loose, washed flower bloom with a long stem, on the inner forearm above the wrist.
Black wash flower on a forearm
Watercolour-style tulip tattoo in pink, red and orange with green leaf and stem on a forearm.
Watercolour tulip on a forearm
Fine line black tattoo of two roses on a stem with a leaf, sitting on the outer upper arm.
Two roses with stems on an upper arm
Colour tattoo of a pink rose with green leaves on the forearm, drawn with a dark outline and soft watercolour-style shading.
Pink rose with green leaves on a forearm
A botanical-style pink rose with green leaves and a red stem on the outer forearm of a pale arm, with bare toes and grass in the background.
Pink rose and leaves on a forearm
Colour tattoo of a red rose with a small bud and green leaves on the inner wrist.
Red rose with buds on a wrist
Realistic colour tattoo of four red poppies on green stems, running down the forearm against a dark background.
Red poppies with stems on a forearm
Black and grey dotwork rose with a stem and leaves tattooed on the inner forearm of a person with pale skin.
Black and grey rose on a forearm
Red poppy flowers with grey stems and buds in a painterly botanical tattoo on the lower leg near the ankle.
Red poppies on a lower leg
Black and grey rose tattoo with a long stem and leaves on a forearm, drawn in botanical linework with dotwork shading.
Rose with stem and leaves on a forearm
Collage of four photos showing a red rose band tattoo with dark green leaves wrapped around a forearm and wrist, in neo-traditional colour.
Red rose band tattoo around a forearm

From the plentytattoo archive, uploaded by a user. Is this your work? Ask for credit or removal.