Tattoo Style Guide

With my books opening next weekend (6th - 8th February 2026) I thought I'd put together this guide to differences within my tattoo style, to help anyone that's getting their tattoo idea together 🙂.

If you want a basic overview of how my tattoo booking process works (including all the questions that will be in the booking form) you can check that out HERE.

But this is a bit more of a deep dive into style choices that you might not have even noticed in my work….

Style Differences

So I obviously have a very specific tattoo style, but there are differences within my work that you may not have considered. These can be helpful for me to know your preferences about, when it comes time to design your tattoo.

The obvious things that are consistent in my style are:

I only work in black ink.
I use a mix of fine and bold line weights.
I use line and whip-stipple shading for details.

But there are differences in line weights, coverage, shading style, contrast, and animal detailing that you might have not noticed just yet!

But don't worry I've put together some examples so you can have a think about them before you submit your tattoo project next weekend 🙂.

Also keep in mind these are specific to me and my style, so other artists might not know what the heck you're talking about if you use these descriptions with them 😂.

LINE WEIGHTS

So ‘line weight’ means the literally thickness of the lines in the tattoo design.

My ‘regular’ linework includes three different line weights, I think of them as bold, regular and fine.

I can lean into either end of this scale. So I do ‘fineline’ pieces that include more fine and regular lines, and just a little heavy. And I also do ‘bold’ pieces that include more regular and bold lines and just a little fine.

This is often based on the scale of the tattoo (ie. I don't tattoo tiny things with a heavy line). But some clients prefer a heavier or finer line weight…

COVERAGE

When it comes to large scale work, it's important to consider coverage.

Some clients want patchwork style sleeves, which have space between the different elements.

Some people are looking for a more continuous look, but with some negative space in the background.

And then some people want full coverage with fully blacked out or shaded backgrounds…

CONTRAST

When it comes to contrast I'm talking about the overall look of the tattoo.

Low contrast pieces have a more consistent amount of shading // details throughout the piece, and high contrast will have more dark and light areas that draw attention to the piece…

SHADING STYLE

There are a couple of shading styles that I use. I refer to them as my ‘regular’ shading and then ‘block’ shading.

Block shading is when I mark out the shadow line and then shade from it, and regular shading doesn't have this.

To make this example more obvious I've chosen all peony tattoos in these examples…

ANIMAL VARIATIONS

I love to tattoo animals, and I feel like I have two different variations when it comes to them.

The first is my more ‘realistic’ style. I'm using the term realistic loosely here, but this is when I use stipple shading to show muscle form, fur texture, pattern for a generally more realistic look.

And then I have a more ‘stylised’ style (yes I know that sounds stupid), which is a little more like woodcut style, that focuses more on pattern, and less on form. Still using stipple shading, but more for decoration than a ‘realistic’ look…

BACKGROUND II

I know we've already talked about this a little bit in the ‘coverage’ section but this is specifically for singular pieces.

You have the option of having background shading in singular pieces. If you take a look at these two sunflower pieces, the top one doesn't have any shading beneath the flower, and the lower one does…

And there you have it, lots of different options for you to think about. Feel free to screenshot any of these for your booking submission nest weekend!

If you have any questions you can reply to this email.

Thanks!

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