In today’s world where almost 25% of all college students in America have tattoos, it is no surprise that a town like New Paltz would provide ample opportunity for its residents to get tatted. A tattoo is a great way to express yourself and add a little pizzazz to your appearance. What better time to do this than around Valentine’s Day? In order to see what local New Paltz tattoo shops were offering for the special occasion, I spent my Valentine’s Day in town talking to New Paltz tattoo artists.
I first spoke to Eric at High Dive Tattoo, which is located in the center of town at 58 Main St. For Valentine’s Day, High Dive Tattoo artists created a Valentine’s Day flash sheet full of love-themed tattoos for customers to choose from. It had many options but consisted mainly of colorful heart, flower and bone designs. These tattoos are a great opportunity to make a statement with local artists’ own unique designs.
Outside of the tattoos on the sheet, Eric explains that he sees “many pairs of customers getting complimentary king and queen of hearts playing card tattoos, and individual customers getting cupid figurines, cherubs and Betty Boop designs.” However, in general he does not notice a spike in tattoo rates around Valentine’s Day at High Dive Tattoo. Instead, he sees “springtime as a more popular time for the shop as tax season rolls around,” and as people begin wearing less layers and showing more skin. If you are looking to get a tattoo whether now or in the warmer weather, High Dive Tattoo is a cool and friendly environment to get it done at, and it is just a short walk from campus.
After talking to Eric, I headed over to Inksane Asylum Tattoo, located at Suite 15 on 246 Main St. I spoke to Grayson, who told me all about Inksane Asylum Tattoo’s unique Valentine’s Day offers. Inksane Asylum hosted a Valentine’s Day flash sale event on Feb. 10, the Saturday before Valentine’s Day. For this event, Inksane Asylum’s artists created a booklet full of incredible love and heartbreak themed designs. At the event, customers could get up to three tattoos at $40 each, with piercings also at a lowered price of $30 per hole (not including genitals and dermals).
The walk-in, first-come first-serve event began at 10 a.m., although the line for the popular event began before 8 a.m. It ran well into the afternoon, with the most popular tattoo being a clever design that displayed the words love and hate. “It was a great success, with around 130 tattoos done on 78 people and 67 piercings done on 40 people,” said Grayson. This comes as no surprise as the $40 cost is hard to find elsewhere. If you missed their Valentine’s Day event, be sure to catch their Saint Patrick’s Day flash sale event on March 16, with the same price deals and start time as the Valentine’s Day special.