Today we’d like to introduce you to Lucy Lovecraft.
Hi Lucy, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
As a bit of a trigger warning, I will discuss some heavier topics here such as sexual assault since it is a huge issue in the tattoo industry. But I have curated my entire career and business around being a safe space for women and queer people due to what I have witnessed and I can’t properly tell my story without talking about what I went through to get here.
I’ve always been an artist, but honestly I had never really though about becoming a tattooer until I got my first one at 18. I come from a family of super smart people so wanting a career in the arts wasn’t exactly my mother’s happiest day haha. I joined the army as an intelligence analyst when I was 18, simply because I was too broke to do anything else and I wanted to travel the world. And I was trying to make my mom proud for choosing a lucrative career. I loved moving around though. Although the places the army sent me weren’t exactly the most exciting. But I was injured after only a year in, and got sent home for medical reasons. I admit, I did not enjoy the military life. I knew it was going to be more difficult as a woman, but really I wasn’t expecting just how much harder it really was being in such a male dominated career path. It always felt like I had to pretend to be someone else just to survive.
So when I got sent home, I was so miserable. I had no idea what I was going to do. When I went to get my first tattoo, I ran into the trouble of finding a good artist. I knew nothing about tattoos. No one in my family had them. I’d never even stepped foot in a shop before. But every artist local to me I just kept thinking “Gosh I can draw way better than this.” haha
Even the good artists I did find wouldn’t do what I wanted. I wanted bright colors, girly designs, anything other than dark bold traditional. It was so impossible to find! When I finally found my artist hours away, I paid so much money then I just was thinking “I need to do this. Cool art AND it will pay the bills? Sign me up” And that’s how it all started.
Finding an apprenticeship is very difficult. I was living in Huntsville, AL at the time with my mom. Most of the shops I went in to there were just kind of shady or the people straight up mean. So I decided to try the big city where there were more tattooers. I figured after my time in the army I could deal with another male dominated career path but honestly somehow tattooing was scarier than the military haha
I was literally just walking in to every tattoo shop in Nashville with only my little portfolio and a dream. I just kept thinking that if someone could show me the basics, as an artist I was sure I could figure out the rest myself. I finally got my apprenticeship in 2017 in Gallatin at a tiny little street shop called Cardinal Tattoo. Goodness I was so excited. I didn’t even realize I had basically joined a cult haha. I was still living in Huntsville, driving up and couch hopping on weekends while I worked for free at the shop. Eventually 8 months later I had started tattooing enough where I was able to move there permanently. Then I was in the middle TN area ever since.
At the time a bunch of women worked at the shop, which was really cool to me at first. All the shops I had been to at this point, women were SCARCE. But it turns out it was all part of the smokescreen. The owner, my mentor, was not a good person at all. He was nice at first, but then the second I quit my main job and made his shop my whole source of income things changed.
He was insanely controlling. How I spoke, how I dressed, what I tattooed all had to be run by him first. I was once again wearing a mask. I did whatever I thought I had to do to be successful, which was catering to the male gaze. I was flirty, sexy, and raunchy. I did big scary dark tattoos and was banned from the colorful cute stuff I loved. In fact, one day for my birthday I was allowed to tattoo whatever I wanted. So I did a flash event of cute designs and there were women lined up out the door to get tattooed by me. It was such a turning point in my career. I have never seen that many women in a tattoo shop before. We had always been told women don’t get tattoos. When really it was just no one was around to make women feel safe enough to come in and get them.
It really felt like an abusive relationship. He would bully us, belittle us, pit us against each other for fun. If at any point we said or even looked uncomfortable, he would threaten to fire us. Sometimes he would, then call us a few days later to come back. It was hell. He would harass me daily and sexually assaulted me numerous times all as a “joke”. I found out when I had finally left that he had sexually assaulted nearly every woman there too. Clients and his coworkers. He had even been arrested for raping his client a few years prior in Murfreesboro and got only a slap on the wrist.
Because I knew if I quit, I would not be able to find another apprenticeship. Artists very rarely will take on other apprentices.
I even witnessed other male artists do the same. They would always harass the women. And there was absolutely nothing I could do. The police were no help. And when I would even complain to the other women there I would get brushed off. I was told he gave me a career, putting up with him was the least I could do and if I didn’t like it I could quit. I really felt trapped. When I finally quit, I never thought I’d tattoo again. I called him out publicly for what I had witnessed, which is how I found out about everything else he had been doing. Dozens of women DM’d me with similar stories about this man. And hundreds more just shared their own similar stories about being sexually assaulted in tattoo shops; clients and tattooers alike. I was blown away. It is such a career wide problem and no one in the industry talks about it. When I did, trying to find a new job at a new job was even more difficult. They all knew who I was, and even though they praised me publicly for being brave enough to call him out, they said I was a liability to hire because they were scared of being called out as well and didn’t want to be, as they put it, “me too’d”
The man still tattoos to this day. He can no longer do tattoo conventions due to public backlash, but in TN he won’t lose his license for raping his clients. So he instead rebranded, changed the name of the shop, now owns and runs Lighthouse Tattoo in Lebanon.
I vowed right then and there that I HAD to somehow become a tattoo artist. I wanted to become a tattoo artist and finally be able to have a good enough career that I could protect other women without my own career being at risk.
I did finally have a woman take pity on me and agree to finish my apprenticeship. One of my former coworkers at the same studio. After my public call out post went viral, pretty much all of the women finally gathered their strength and left. I think fully we didn’t realize it was all happening to each other as well.
She and I jumped around from shop to shop for a bit, which was eye opening. I saw very similar behaviors in nearly every shop I was at. Not always as extreme, but every shop had at least one tattooer that was known to be a creep to women.
The fact that it was so normalized blew me away. Everyone was so scared of being dramatic, they never wanted to call anyone out. Or when it was their friends, they painted it as harmless. In fact, only one shop I worked at had zero problems and I felt like a rescue dog in a nice house for the first time haha I kept waiting for the awfulness to pop up but everyone there was amazing.
After seeing all that, I worked as hard as I could. I studied, I painted, I cried a lot, but I did it. I’m finally at the point in my career where I have the strength to stand up to anyone I need to. I feel so lucky now that I have my own private studio where client comfort is my number one priority.
I have my adorably girly cute tattoo room that’s safe and comfortable for anyone who wants to come in.
It’s also amazing now that there’s more female and queer tattooers than ever. So I do fully feel like the industry is changing for the better.
It is still difficult at times, I have ended friendships over defending my clients. Whenever my former boss does awful things again, I’m always the first one messaged to call him out again. Because I guess other tattooers are scared to call him out themselves.
But I wouldn’t change it for anything.
Ideally, I’d love to somehow one day help alter the laws that give more protections to assault victims in the tattoo industry. One day at a time though haha.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Honestly I think in my previous message I told my whole crazy career journey haha. My journey into becoming a tattooer was a straight up nightmare. But I feel like when one goes through trauma you have two mindsets; I went through it and paid my dues, so you do too. Or, I went through it, and I will make sure no one else ever has to go through what I did. I’m the latter.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I am a custom tattoo artist and I specialize in color. I am known particularly for my watercolor tattoos. I do super bright vibrant tattoos and delicate lines which is perfect for anyone who doesn’t much care for the heavy, dark, bold tattoos that were industry standard until recently.
I would say I’m proud of my coverups. I am slowly becoming the go to artist for coverups around here which makes me so happy. I love being able to rework or hide old tattoos and give someone new pleasant memories.
I’m most proud of my studio. I had such a rocky start into tattooing I’m so proud I can be a safe space for people who have been so unwelcome in the tattoo industry for so long.
I only do custom designs so anything you get is unique and designed by me.
So, before we go, how can our readers or others connect or collaborate with you? How can they support you?
I have two primary forms of social media. My instagram, which my handle is @lovecraftlucy and my facebook page which is just Lucy Lovecraft. I share all my work there, so anyone can comment their support or share the love. Or if anyone wants to book, I do everything through email. Which is lovecraftlucytattoo@gmail.com
I just need to know what you want, where you want it, what your budget is, and any relevant photos.
My pricing is super fair. I have a $100 minimum, and everything is based on my $150 hourly rate. I do larger stuff based on sessions which is $600 for a half day or $1100 for a full day. But if you have a budget, due to being a custom artist, I can generally design something to match a budget. All pricing is discussed before we even get started so before you sit in the chair you’ll know exactly what you’ll pay.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lovecraftlucy/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lovecraftlucy
