So you’ve finally take the inky plunge. We can’t give you any guidance on design – so by all means get the name of that person you’ve been dating for three weeks – but we can tell you how to keep whatever you’ve opted for in decent nick with some solid tattoo care. Any tattoo artist worth their salt will either recommend a good antiseptic cream, or supply you with a small kit of tattoo care goodies to take care of that sucker. If they don’t however, head to the chemist for an antiseptic cream, which should be applied lightly and frequently. Because the needle has punctured the skin, the immediate here is not regret (that might come later) but infection. Which is a nasty and painful business if allowed to take hold. Let’s put it this way; you won’t want to show off your new ink for a while when there’s an infection in play. So, best tattoo care practices are warm water, soap, rinse, cream, repeat.
Follow this tattoo care routine for five days and things should begin to settle down. Then it’s time to moisturise and we mean daily. The stuff you use on the rest of your body will do fine, but since this is one item you’re going to wear for the rest of your life, a bit of extra effort is worth it. Mainly because in addition to hydrating the skin, specialist creams have additional ingredients whose job it is to maintain the vibrancy of the ink colours. Look for a moisturiser with an SPF of at least 50…so, sunscreen. Any kind of sunburn in the first 6 months can lead to a faded, muddy tatt. Just keep that in mind.
