TATTOOS are all the rage – ask Monmouth's Simon Lewis who now provides his little works of art for more women than men.
Simon recently won two awards in an international competition and used the right leg of his trainee tattooist, Rebecca Rees, of Caldicot, for his entry.
"Rebecca volunteered to be the model. I have been training her to become a tattooist and in between customers we worked on the design which won the prize. We are both very pleased," said Simon who works from a shop in St Mary's Street, Monmouth.
Once prized almost exclusively by sailors, tattoos have become more and more popular and are regarded by some as a fashion statement.
"We now provide tattoos for far more women then men – and we get requests to put them is all sorts of odd places," said Simon.
But, he says, he always reminds potential clients that tattoos are permanent.
"They can be removed by laser but we always ask customers to be sure of what they want. There have been lots of times I have tattooed a name on an arm and then a couple of months later had to work out another design to cover it up," he said.