AFTER 34 years, two different tattoo shops and literally thousands of different clients, Sheelagh Ross is calling time on her career as one of Colchester’s longest serving tattoo artists.

It’s been a journey for the 59-year-old, who has been in the industry so long she has seen the sons and daughters of clients walk into the shop decades after having tattooed their parents in the 1990s and 2000s.

And it’s not just tattoos which have become Mrs Ross’ specialty after more than three decades – tattoo artists take up a role akin to that of counsellors during the painstaking hours of preparing inks and outlines.

Designs can range from the simple, to the complex, to the downright bizarre, and the tattooing process can take several hours over numerous sessions.

It is during this time that clients and tattoo artists form a bond with one another, discussing life choices, regrets, relationships, and much more.

Mrs Ross said: “It’s been really good meeting people and hearing their stories – people will tell me things they wouldn’t tell their nearest and dearest, because it’s all said in confidence.

“People have messaged me afterwards to thank me for the life advice – it's quite emotional to be leaving.”

Mrs Ross started out in the tattoo industry back in 1988 when she and her then husband, Dave Ross, ran a tattoo parlour in Magdalen Street.

After they separated, Mrs Ross then went on to open her own tattoo parlour, and she has been at her current studio in Vineyard Street since 2011.

Tattoos have never been generic, but over the years of Mrs Ross’ career, they have still evolved massively.

Since the emergence of the internet, for example, people now show their sporting allegiances on social media profiles and posts online, meaning tattoos have changed to represent different aspects of people’s lives.

She said: “When I first came into tattooing, people had tattoos to show allegiance to a partner or football team or a tattoo might commemorate the birth of a child.

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"Now, a customer will have the internet to choose from for a design.

“But tattoos are one of the few things left in life that’s permanent, because removing them is not an easy process.”

People have access to hundreds of thousands of different ideas, meaning tattooists have had to move with the times and adapt to the different requests which could be thrown at them.

Interestingly, Mrs Ross says, it means phases have gone out of fashion.

She said: “We used to have something which would be fashionable for a year; one year it was dolphins, and another year it would be stars, but now, it can be anything from one day to the next.”

When asked why she was deciding to leave the industry she has been so heavily involved in since her mid-20s, Mrs Ross explained that it was not just the fact she needed a break – financial pressures have also taken their toll.

Businesses as well as households are seriously feeling the effects of the rising cost of living, and Mrs Ross said she would struggle to forgive herself for jacking up the price of her services for loyal customers.

“With everything becoming so expensive, I would have to put my prices up so much I couldn’t look my customers in the eye and say, ‘this is how much it is going to be’," she said. 

“I do think I am getting out at the right moment – the price hikes are going to be very detrimental for people who offer luxury treatments.”

Nevertheless, Mrs Ross has made plenty of friends, and even more memories, over her career – on some occasions though, she has had to turn requests down if they are a little too outrageous.

She said: “One guy came in and wanted a portrait of his mum.

"When he showed me the photograph, it was her in her coffin, and I said ‘I don’t think I can do that – it’s not the way to remember her’.

“When someone asks you for something outrageous, it’s only outrageous the first time you hear it – after that, you just learn not to be shocked.”

Sheelagh Ross Tattooing and Body Piercing will close its doors for the final time next month on Saturday, September 3.

That evening, she will leave put her feet up and contemplate a good job well done.

When asked what she would remember most fondly, she said: “Talking to people and making people happy and helping people with their life choices.

“People don’t have to look me in the eye, so they can just tell me things that are on their mind – I like giving people advice and helping them feel better about themselves.

“Then after my last day, I will toddle off into the sunset.”