Today we’d like to introduce you to Misha.
Misha’s been Tattooing since 1991, starting in the Detroit area then for a few years in both Chicago & New Orleans. Finally landing in Los Angeles in 2003. At the beginning of 2015, Misha opened her Private, Appointment Only, Custom studio: ‘Tattoos by Misha’. Providing a more personal private space.
She specializes in covering up tattoos as well as scars and stretch marks. Since she’s worked all over the country, she is proficient in tattooing many verities of skin colors and types.
She also enjoys dong Celtic knot work, Custom Designing tattoos, Watercolor style, Botanical Illustration style, Henna / Lace designs, and especially Japanese Art.
She views cover up tattoos as a puzzle and a challenge, It’s her job to ‘Back Engineer’ what the client really wants to put there, and figure out what needs to be done to cover the old tattoo.She loves helping a client love the tattoo they once hated.
Has it been a smooth road?
When I tried to break into the tattoo business back in 1991 I knew of only a handful of women tattoo artist across the entire country. I literally had a guy pat me on the head and say it was cute I wanted to tattoo. Luckily I found a few men in the industry who saw how creative I was and believed in me.
After struggling for two years in biker flash tattoo shops, I was asked if I wanted to apprentice with a female tattoo artist that I greatly admired, Mz Jo-D Bonez. A 2-year apprenticeship followed.
After leaving Detroit, and after a short stay in Chicago, I ended up in New Orleans for 5 1/2 years. During this time I had an incredibly abusive boss that would physically threaten, and berate customers as well as myself and the other artist. I finally couldn’t take it anymore and quit; only to find out he had blackballed me from any of the other tattoo shops in the city. I couldn’t find any place work. This was my lowest point in my career, and I seriously thought about quitting altogether.
I moved to L.A. and worked at a few shops, one of them owned by Kari Barba, one of my female heroes in the tattoo community. I settled in at Zulu Tattoo and found my love of tattooing again thanks to Zulu and his wife Khani. After working there for 7 years, the Zulu’s decided to move to Austin. I really didn’t want to work for anybody else, and thought about possibly opening my own studio. Zulu looked at me as told me it was time for me to be my own boss and go for it. My husband and I opened Tattoos by Misha in January of 2015 and I’ve been the happiest ever since.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Tattoos by Misha story. Tell us more about the business.
My business is a Private, Appointment only, Tattoo Studio.
I specialize in Cover-Ups of tattoos that the client is either no longer happy with, or wasn’t happy with in the first place. I’m also known for my cover- up of Scar, tummy tuck scar, and stretch mark cover ups.
I’m proud of the fact that I’ve achieved my dream of owning my own business with my husband and it’s been a success since day one.
I really wanted to focus on making our studio not like what people think a tattoo shop is. There’s art on the walls instead of tattoo flash, I want the clients tattoo to be a collaboration between the client and myself.
We offer our clients Tea or water when they arrive. Clients are usually very nervous or anxious when they come in, and I wanted my studio to be a calm safe space.
The majority of my clients are woman. A lot of the cover-ups I do are part of ending a relationship, or a certain part of their lives they no long want as part of them. Or they are using a tattoo to mark a special accomplishment or achievement, or even a new chapter in their lives. Recently though I’ve been doing far too many memorial tattoos for lost loved ones.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
Right now the tattoo industry is going through a huge technological leap. In the past, I use to have to draw a clients design with pen on paper. If I had to make any changes to the design, I had to re-draw the entire piece. Nowadays, I do everything in my computer tablet. I can take a photo of a clients arm, download it on to my tablet, and sit with the client and sketch out the design with them. If I have to make any changes. I just have to re-do a single layer instead of the whole drawing.
There are several software companies that are designing programs that mimic my tattoo needles and can even draw intricate patterns with a stroke of a pen. Drawings that use to take me hours and hours, now can take me just minutes. In the future I see this type of tech becoming more common among tattoo artist.
Also, clients are expecting more out of their tattoos. In the past, clients use to go into some random shop and pick something off the wall from a Flash Sheet. Today’s clients have realized that tattoos can really be artistic, one of a kind, personal works of art. I really don’t see this changing and only getting more wide spread over the next few years.
Contact Info:
- Address: Tattoos by Misha
Inside Salon Republic
11239 Ventura Blvd #212
Studio City, CA 91604 - Website: www.misha-art.com
- Phone: 818-388-0369
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thecountessofcoverups/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Tattoos-By-Misha-350412471827364/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/BigEyedMisha
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