Category Features

2024 Legacy Scholarship Announcement

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The APP is excited to announce the winners of the 2024 Legacy Scholarships! Congratulations everyone!

Our scholarship program was fully funded by our generous sponsors and the APP. We appreciate you!

Sponsored by Stiletto Piercing Supplies

Dave Kelso Scholarship – mi33tsu (Canada)

Ryan Markwell Scholarship – Josh King (USA)

David Vidra Scholarship – Breo Hoek (UK)

Gail Shub Scholarship – Xhules Gega (Germany)

Sponsored by LeRoi Fine Body Jewellery

Rick Frueh Scholarship – Georgia (UK)

Rick Frueh Scholarship – Andy Forest (Australia)

Sponsored by Canasteel Jewelry

David Vidra Scholarship (Canasteel) – Yürgen van de Velde (USA)

Sponsored by the Association of Professional Piercers

Legacy Scholarship – Victor Huaraca (USA)

Legacy Scholarship – Sonia Deineko (Denmark)

Legacy Scholarship – Phebe Rose (England)

Legacy Scholarship – Anna Skverna (Russian Fed.)

Legacy Scholarship – Vânia Graça (Portugal)

*Contribution to the scholarship program also made by Aurelie Gi

Implementing Change After Conference

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Originally published in The Point: Issue 52

Article by Ryan Ouellette or Precision Body Arts in Nashua, NH.

So you’re back from Conference. Now what are you going to do
with what you learned? I have always found it challenging to take
what I’ve gotten out of Conference and incorporate it into my studio
effectively. I’ve been going to Conference for eight years, and every
year I come home with a laundry list of ideas. Honestly though, not
many are finished before I lose my motivation. My main problem
is that I try to tackle them all right away instead of focusing on one
and seeing it through to completion. There is so much information
available at Conference that you can easily get overwhelmed. Trying
to take all the information from the classes, round tables, and expo
and turn it into immediate change in your studio is an easy way to
melt your brain, or start a fight with your co-workers. Trust me; I
know.

This year, I tried a different approach. I put together my usual list
of ideas and changes that I would like to enact, then ranked them by
what I thought would be the most beneficial to my studio as a whole.
I also tried to get a good idea of how much time, effort, and money it
would take to complete each task. It really helps when you can think
step-by-step what it would take to improve a certain aspect of your
studio or your procedures. You might be surprised that the biggest
impact could come from faster, smaller improvements. I tend to
over-think things a lot in my studio. Way too many supplies, way too
many unnecessary steps. My big focus this year was breaking down
why I do what I do, and finding ways to simplify things without
degrading performance. Not all of it will work, and not all of it will
be permanent, but focusing on improvement is important in an
industry that changes so much from year to year.

One of my biggest obstacles is that I’m the only piercer in my
shop, but I have three tattoo artists who share my sterilization room
and decontamination practices. Coming home with a list of “piercing
things” that I would like them to focus on typically means I have
my tattoo staff fed up with me rather than changing their practices
effectively. It’s a good idea to consider what things on your list will be
the most helpful to other members of the studio, and even which ones
will be the most problematic. I decided to start with my sterilization
room because I thought I could improve our decontamination
chain while also making things faster and easier for all of the staff;
a win-win for everybody. I never really noticed that I had all these
extra glove changes and surface disinfects because I was simply doing
things on the wrong counter top or that I had supplies in the wrong
cabinets. When I sat down and thought it over with the information
I picked up at Conference, it was easy to see that I just needed to
move a few things around. Of course, it all seems so obvious now,
after Conference, but immediately after I reorganized the supplies
in my sterilization room, everything got so much faster and more
efficient. It only took me a few hours to move stuff around, but I feel
like it was a big improvement in the overall functionality of a central
aspect of our work week. Now we can zip through our sterilization
work without sacrificing safety or quality. Plus, the tattoo guys can
correctly process their tools faster without getting pissy and without
me staring over their shoulders.

Once I tackled the sterilization room I suddenly got really
productive. I went back to my list, picked another job and followed
it through to completion before starting the next one. I was finding
little improvements I could make all over the place. A lot of them only
took an hour out of my day, and most of them didn’t cost anything.
I switched our shop over from spray disinfectants to wipes and put
wall mounts in each work area for them. I reworked the area where
we keep our general cleaning supplies so our counter girl doesn’t have
to go into the sterilization room to just grab a dustpan or extra trash
bags. I moved the front counter supplies like gloves, baggies, and
hand sanitizer to one central drawer. They’re small improvements
that make the shop much more efficient and make our work day so
much easier. These are things I’ve been telling myself I wanted to do
for months, or even years, but I just never worked out a game plan
to get it all done. Many little things are very attainable and add up to
make a big difference.

For years I’ve been coming home from Conference all energetic
and trying to do ten things at once, just to end up with ten half
finished things that would keep distracting me. After a while you
lose that Conference high and you just go back to the status quo.
This year I realized that having a system can dramatically impact the
amount you accomplish. Then when you get home from Conference
next year you can change it all over again! P

Sharing The Wealth

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In the 1990’s, Jim Ward observed that there were a lot of body piercing studios opening
up. Over the years since the 1975 establishment of Gauntlet, Jim and his staff had
developed and refined the best in body piercing techniques, with safety and successful
outcomes in mind. Jim decided that that expertise should be shared with the inevitably
expanding body piercing profession. First the Pierce With A Pro videos, and then
Gauntlet’s body piercing seminars – Responsible Body Piercing – made the techniques
widely available.

Go to runningthegauntlet-book.com to get your copies of these
historical looks at what was state of the art.

Looking back at performance art.

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The following pages feature articles from issue 49 of Piercing Fans International Quarterly, 1992. Over 30 years have passed, but the art was as vital then as it is today. Used with the permission of Gauntlet Enterprises.

Cover of PFIQ issue 49 with Spike the Holocaust Girl photographed by Christine Kessler.

Back cover of PFIQ Issue 49 featuring Ron Athey in the “st. Sebastian Enlightened in a Zen Garden” scene of The Casting Out/A Crown of Thorns performance at L.A.C.E. Los Angeles, November 13, 1992. Photo by Dikon Lewis.

Paul King

Image from David Wojnarowicz photo series Silence Through Economics.

In demonic drag Paul King torments Andrew Fucker during the San Francisco performance of Man’s Ruin.

Motivation and presentation may have changed, but the act of the artist using bodily fluids and perforated flesh as a vehicle of expression is nothing new. In the 70s, artist/groups such as Marina Abromovic and Coum Transmissions, later known as Throbbing Gristle, incorporated blood letting in their performances. In the 80s blood performances attracted greater atten tion. The artist Stelarc suspended himself from a crane over the streets of Copenhagen, held by giant hooks through his flesh.

Portraying the human body as “obsolete,” he gained international notoriety. The collaboration team of Ron Athey and Rozz Williams, known as Premature Ejaculation, was filleting and nailing themselves—and a few road kill—for Los Angeles audiences. On the subject of nails, performance artist Bob Flannigan would hammer the head of his dick to a board and then pry the nail out. AIDS activist/writer/ performance artist David Wojnarowicz utilized similar techniques when he stitched his lips shut as a visual testimony to the concept “Silence = Death.”

Through literature, music videos, high fashion, media sensationalism and governmental hysteria, the sub-culture of permanent and performance piercing has penetrated the mainstream. Don’t be surprised when Barbie starts sporting a “belly button ring.” Increased public attention, both negative and positive, has enabled cutting edge artists like Ron Athey to break from the underground circuit to “proper” performance theaters. Performing in established art environments with greater budgets, the artist can more accurately and elaborately bring their vision to stage.

Performance piercing in the 90s originated in the nightclub. At L. A.’s nightclub “Fuck!”, friends of the promoters included S/M practitioners, who started bringing their sex lives to the dance podium. Performers such as Elayne Binnie, Ron Athey and Crystal Cross were at the forefront.

Fetishism and exhibitionism were the primary motivations. Initial responses ranged from shock and revulsion, to admiration and lust. Most of what you see in nightclubs these days has become narrowly focused on shock value.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a good shock more than anyone. However, one cannot rely on sticking needles through flesh to be shocking forever. At some point the shock fades. With repeated exposure even a strong image will lose its power. Just think of TV violence. Unfortunately for most viewers, there’s little variation available. Play pierced lips and ball dances are becoming as passé as navel piercings. It’s difficult to pinpoint where content and progression began to evolve with the individual performer. The process seemed to evolve unconsciously through the repetition of recurring fetish themes.

I was doing shows in nightclubs and as demonstrations for S/M organizations. I became detached; mechanical. The repetitive action of sticking needles through skin had become monotonous; perhaps I had just come to realize that action alone is empty. I began to incorporate my darker feelings into the pieces, creating a sort of psychodrama. Oftentimes I had preexisting relationships with my collaborators and assistants. When I allowed my feelings for the person to fuel the inspiration, the pieces developed depth. My work was now the expression and release of love, obsession, fear, insecurity and vanity. I used images of operating rooms, dungeons and dark basements. Bodily fluids, such as vomit, blood, piss, spit and tears are my favorite medium.

The first work of mine that contained any real substance was “Fuck Art…This is Love.” My partner at the time, Bud Cockerham, was an artist who is HIV positive. I delved into my unconscious fear of watching someone I love being reduced, wasted, and destroyed. I focused my anger at the idea of making love becoming synonymous with cross contamination. Intimacy was death. My anguish materialized. The piece takes place in a plastic-encased operating room. The

audience’s view is clouded and nightmarish. Masked , goggled and garbed head to toe in surgical scrubs, I catheterized him, infused his scrotum to monstrous proportions, sutured his lips shut, carved “HIV+” into his chest, and sprayed him and the enclosed room in his blood. In later performances this image was pushed and the ending changed. I introduced another character who is HIV-. Both drenched in their own blood, they make love through a polyurethane wall.

Mic Rawls in a Paul King performance Halloween night in New York.

“Puff-n-Snuff” is playtime in my darkest fantasies. The piece is a tribute to the bogeyman, killer clowns, Texas Chain Saw Massacre and of course, Dennis Cooper. It’s a snuff (murder) fantasy. The killer clown has two victims in a basement, mummified and tied to ladders. Hundreds of pictures of one of the victims are obsessively scattered all over the walls. One of the pictures is placed over a victim’s face. The clown straps on a dildo harness equipped with a 10” steel knife and proceeds to fuck one of the victims to death. A sterile piercing needle is attached into a battery powered drill which the clown presses through the victims’ cheeks. The clown then uses a circular saw to rip through arms and gut the abdomens of the victims. The lights dim while the clown writhes in organs and masturbates with the intestines. Don’t worry; all mutilations, except the drilling, are  stunts.

My recent work has gotten lighter, even playful. In the piece “Man’s Ruin,” co-creator Brian Murphy and I brought to life the elements of the traditional tattoo flash of the pin-up girl sitting in a martini glass framed with playing cards and dice. The image pays respect to vice and the sorrow it brings. The piece is staged as a game show hosted by a Las Vegas devil boy and devil girl. Flashing lights, blaring trashy rock, outrageous costumes and props set a dream-like mood. We tempt the contestant with the vices of sex, money, drugs, liquor and vanity. Every time he reaches for his desire we “hook” him. The viewers are the game show’s audience. Their cheers and cries egg us on to hurt him more. One by one, fishhooks pierce his finger webs, cheeks, scrotum and legs which are then strung up to a frame in the image of giant dice. The game continues until he dies. The show ends with rock-n-roll drag-queen nurses body bagging and toe-tagging the loser.

Owning my feelings and fantasies, confronting social taboos and phobias is my work’s passion. Catharsis became the mother of invention. The audience doesn’t always understand the artist’s motivation or the message; with art that isn’t always relevant. Whether awe-inspired or repulsed, rarely is one unmoved. v

Changing Myself While Changing Others

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By Jezebel Voulé

What has been your favorite piercing moment? It is a question that has haunted me since the first time I was asked. An echo of this makes the voice in my head always think “maybe this piercing will be the one that defines my piercing career.” Several people have shared their defining moments with me: some of these turning points involved meeting their piercing idol while, for others, it was defined by where they worked, who they worked with (or worked on), and, in some cases, a paycheck. The ways people have been affected by their careers are as unique as the individuals who had the experiences.

Most days there are no moments that change me, or at least affect me in a drastic way. I take a client in, bond with them and then let them go, hoping that we connected enough for them to return to me for their next piercing experience—or, better yet, remember my name to bring me more clients to bond with and release.

However, when asked about my favorite moment there is one I always relive. An older lady, at least seventy years old, came in to get her earlobe pierced. We took a moment chatting but as I started to get set up for the piercing she stopped me. “I need you to know that I have Hep C. I understand if you can’t pierce me.” After asking if she had talked to her physician about getting a piercing I smiled and said “Thank you for telling me but I have no problem piercing you. I take many precautions so that both my safety and yours are taken care of.” She was shocked that I didn’t respond like she had expected. She thought I would react poorly and then proceed to treat her as a leper, sending her on her way. Both she and her wife were overcome with joy. It was something she had wanted to do for a long time but had been afraid to get because she would have to expose a secret that had given her so many other bad experiences. (I later found out how much that experience changed her perception of herself. She, for a moment, felt like she was human rather than a disease and not worth common decency. I had felt like I had changed the world, and for her I had.)

Recently another experience left the same type of lasting impression on me. While at Omega Red Studios a man came in asking questions about his daughter. She had cancer and, as a result, had made a “bucket list.” On that list was a lip piercing. He wanted to help her fulfill her wishes and asked if I would be willing to perform such a task on her. I had replied that I would be willing, after I knew it was okay with her doctor. The next day he came back with a handwritten note. Skeptical that the doctor was in on this idea I Google searched the doctor and found out everything I could about not only her but the entire hospital. I talked to lawyers, her doctors, and parents about what I expected, what they should expect, and the young girl’s expectations. I did not hold back on making demands on what I would need to make a safe and positive environment for her. Many of them were personal things to increase my comfort. After all, my safety is just as important as hers.

It took three days to come to an agreement on piercing her. After speaking with the doctor we decided the nostril would be a more acceptable piercing rather than the lip. I learned that the reason there was so much passion behind her parents getting this one thing done was because she had just received a dire prognosis. The likelihood that she would be alive long enough to even see her piercing heal was slim. She had fifteen things that she wanted to do before she died. Her parents chose this task, as it was most obtainable, and came in search of me. Completing one of her bucket list tasks was important in helping her fight the feeling that all was lost for this fourteen year old whose life was on a count down. The before and after effect on her life was immediate. She went from a child who looked and acted sickly to a young girl who wanted to walk around with her father as she felt a kind of rejuvenation.

***

These moments have stuck with me, as it has been these moments that have pushed me to realize how much I could help the world just with a tiny prick of my needle. Sometimes a navel piercing is more than a belly adornment, it is a story—a celebration—of a woman reclaiming her body. It amazes me how much a person can be changed from something that, for me, is just a way of life: the impact of one life to another. Everyone has different reasons for loving their job. So please take a moment and relish yours.

Originally published January 2nd, 2014 by Jezebel Voulé

2024 APP Legacy Scholarship

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The 2024 Legacy Scholarship Program is now taking applications to attend the upcoming APP Conference & Exposition, taking place at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas, June 23-28!

This is funding for approximately 8 piercers in need of financial assistance to attend this educational event and recipients are required to work more than 30 hours during the Conference. Accommodations and Conference registration are included in the Scholarship, but you must provide your own transportation to and from the Conference and cover your own meals.

So, do you qualify? Here’s a few things that are required for eligibility.

-You must be 21 years or old by the time Conference happens.
-You must have never attended Conference before (some exceptions do apply).
-You must be working in a studio and have at least six months experience before Conference.

All applicants will be considered based on the following criteria.

-Financial Need: This scholarship is for piercers who cannot attend the conference without assistance.
-Participation in the industry outside of your own studio.
-Demonstrating interest in bettering your skills/circumstances.
-Enthusiasm for the opportunity.
-Spirit of volunteering / Demonstrating work ethic / Humility

Do you feel that this scholarship applies to you? Take a peek at the detailed information and the application right here through this link: 2024 Legacy Scholarship Information and Application.

You have until January 31, 2024 to apply.

Good luck everyone!

Creative Innovator Award 2023 Queen Of The Ashes

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Queen of the Ashes award winning design “Kwaidan.” Picture by @connorfornow


At this year’s APP Conference, Queen of the Ashes won the Creative Innovators Award for their design “Kwaidan.” We had the opportunity to talk to Hika K, the owner of Queen of the Ashes, to discuss her award winning design and her company.

The Point Blog: Congratulations on your Innovative Award win, Hika! Your company, Queen of the Ashes, has been gaining a lot of popularity lately and your newest earring design was a hit at this years APP Conference. We also saw quite a few folks wearing other pieces from your company during this year’s Conference. How are you feeling?

Queen of the Ashes: Thank you so much! Honestly, I am still quite overwhelmed. Last years APP Conference went already well, but this years positive feedback, especially after winning the Innovators Award, still feels quite surreal. I am incredibly happy that people love my designs and it still makes me giddy every time I see somebody wearing my jewelry.

The Point Blog: Tell us more about your company and when you started designing such interesting pieces.

Queen of the Ashes: I started Queen of the Ashes in 2019, but the first design – The Scavenger Queen – had been on my mind since 2016, as well as a few other pieces. I found it quite hard to find any reputable jewelry company making ear weights representing my more crust-punky taste. The main push I needed was my significant other convincing me to just dive in and bring the punk aesthetics back into the piercing industry.

The Point Blog: Have you had to face many challenges in the industry with your new company right before the pandemic? Did you face other challenges being based in Germany?

Queen of the Ashes: Somewhat yes, somewhat no. I would say, the greatest challenge was starting off right before Covid hit and the world slowed down, so our customer base could not grow as fast as I would have wished. On the other hand, this gave me the opportunity to slow down and carefully perfect the designs I had in my mind. Of course, being located in Europe has been tricky, especially when travel was not an option, which made it impossible to show off my designs besides when being at a guest piercing guest spot; most German studios would not invest in a small, nearly unknown German brand for ear weights, as the top studios we have usually tend to rather invest into gold. And even after the world opened again, having a booth at APP for the first time was probably far more organizational work than it would be for a company from the States or from Canada. But of course I can’t compare how things would have been if I would have started my company in another country.

The Point Blog: Do you find your pieces to be more popular at home than in other parts of the world?

Queen of the Ashes: I definitely noticed that my designs tend to fare better on the US market, not only when it comes to wholesale clients, but also when it comes to orders on the retail side. This seems to be usual with ear weights in general though, as I hear often that ear weights don’t move much in German studios for example – so the pieces my wholesale customers prefer in Germany are those for traditional earrings.

The Point Blog: We’ve noticed that many of your pieces are limited and those limited pieces seem to be in high demand! Do you plan on continuing to keep things exclusive?

Queen of the Ashes: Yes, definitely! I love the idea of exclusivity and the collectability of jewelry, but since I prefer to keep an accessible price point I decided on achieving the first point through the limitation of designs. While I regularly make limited designs like the Hunters and the Aliens, with the former being sold out since this year’s APP Conference, I plan on keeping the amount of designs I offer small, so some pieces from the first year will eventually have to go too. At the same time we have a few one off pieces, as most of the stone combinations for the Feral Children for example will not be repeated.

The Point Blog: Tell us a bit about what gave you the idea to create your winning design.

Queen of the Ashes: I am honestly not sure. I had a loose idea of this design already 10 years ago, but I am pretty sure that the main inspiration had been the J-Horror-Movies I watched as a young teenager, as well as many other Japanese ghost stories I read over the years (and still am reading). I remember staying in a house in Japan years back, and on the ceiling of the closet a board was slid open so we got a glimpse into the attic. I couldn’t shake the idea of waking up in the night and the moonlight shining in, to illuminate hair hanging down through this opening. As I said, watching too many of those movies, and then that image lead to hair hanging on earrings. And of course traditional tatami flooring belonged into every Japanese ghost story in my eyes, which is why I chose that pattern for the brass part of our “Kwaidan” ear weights.

“Kwaidan” designed by Queen of the Ashes. Picture by @connorfornow


The Point Blog: Who knew that one moment in time would inspire the creation such a beautiful earring design! Do you feel that how you find inspiration for your pieces is what separates Queen of the Ashes from other competitors who may be offering comparable designs?

Queen of the Ashes: I would say the main difference would be that many of my designs are quite niche, with many of them being wearable art than designs which fit into a wider audience. I consider Queen of the Ashes my playground, so I don’t always think about what may be selling in big quantities but rather what I think may be cool. I don’t think of other jewelry designers as competitors though; I rather consider us all as fellow artists, many of whom I look up to and whose work I adore.

The Point Blog: Where else does your inspiration come from? Who inspires you?

Queen of the Ashes: I sometimes wonder that myself. Many of my ideas just visualize in front of me, as I tend to think in pictures. So some pieces just seem to have existed in me; some are homages to literature or movies which I love. Some pieces have been requested by customers, with me mainly giving them the shape to make the idea wearable. There is also a small handful of designs either developed by friends or my significant other which are even more fun to work with than the ones I develop alone, since we all share the creative input, we are sticking our heads together to perfect those ones.

The Point Blog: What can we expect to see next from Queen of the Ashes?

Queen of the Ashes: First of all, a new website bringing together the retail and wholesale shop with an easier user surface that hopefully we will launch in late autumn or winter. There are also a lot of new designs in production, most of them going more into the direction of mythology, obviously many more pieces with popcultural references, but, what I am mostly excited for, are new alternatives for wearing surfaces to combine with hanging designs. Similar to our Ties that Bind, I am playing around with fun new ways for my customers to make their own individual jewelry combinations.

Find Queen of the Ashes online!
Website: http://queenoftheashesjewelry.de
Instagram: @queenoftheashes_jewelry
Email: queenofashesjewelry@gmail.com

Hika, owner of Queen of the Ashes

Innovator Award 2023 Regalia Jewelry

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Regalia’s Innovative Award winning design “Pin Crimp.”

At this year’s APP Conference, Regalia won the Innovator’s Award for their “Pin Crimp” design. We were fortunate enough to have a chat with the owner of Regalia, Derrick Edward R. and asked him about his latest invention and his beginnings in the industry.

The Point: Congratulations on your win in the Innovators Award. You also won the Best Single Booth award at the APP Conference this year. You all must be very excited!

Regalia: Thank you! It was a bit of a surprise when I got a text message saying we won both awards (we didn’t attend the closing party). To be honest, I think we should have won the best booth award last year; Some people might remember the reliquary that the Regalia crew spent weeks working on with “Sadima” the mummy empress. It was a bit of an upset, so this year, we’d intentionally planned a much simpler approach and wanted to focus on sales and operation. We all kind of joked to ourselves because we thought we were thrown a bone this year because whoever felt bad we didn’t win last year. In any case, it feels good to have hard work acknowledged.

The Point: What inspired you to create this concept and how does it set itself apart from similar concepts?

Regalia: We’d always had the thought of, “Ya know it’d be really cool if there was a specific tool that bent our threadless pins in a way that didn’t sacrifice the integrity of the pin itself so there would be less breakage” Then that turned into… “Imagine if we could get customers to be able to change their jewelry out on their own so they can focus on building their jewelry wardrobe without having to wait in line at their local piercing studio just to get something changed out.”

When the pandemic happened, it became, “All these people with threadless jewelry sitting at home that can’t go into their local piercings studios.” During normal times, we can definitely appreciate the human to human interaction and experience of going into a piercing studio to ogle and jewelry, purchase, and have it put in… But we also have found value in turning the ‘necessity’ of piercer assistance vs. ‘convenience’ of piercer assistance when it comes to having jewelry changed out. While we always recommend clients visit their piercers to make sure their piercings have healed correctly and are healthy, there’s something to be said about giving the power and confidence to the client to work with their own accessories. It also helps facilitate the move toward eCommerce as studios become more open to selling threadless jewelry in their online stores.

The design itself is meant to provide a consistent and desired result. We understood that the pliers could be used by an extremely WIDE range of people, whether piercers or “end-wearers” as we like to call them. The brilliance of our first prototype was that no matter how hard you squeezed the pliers, they would bend the pin in same exact way, the same exact amount. There’s only one other pair of pliers that are currently sold as dedicated threadless pin pliers, but we haven’t seen too much success in our industry with the use of them. Ultimately our goal is to make them so easy to use, that they become a no-brainer in needing to have them if preserving threadless jewelry is important! Many people have used other pliers in non-intended ways to bend pins with success, but we want people not to have to figure anything out. We’ll do that for you. ;D

The Point: We think this design is really neat! Is this tool a one-off creation or do you have plans to create more tools in the future?

Regalia: That’s a really good question. I suppose it depends on the success of this tool. I imagine that there will different versions of the final product of our Pin Crimp. Anyone else have any ideas?

The Point: Regalia has been around for some time and is widely known as a body jewelry company. Tell us more about yourself and the history of your company.

Regalia: Haa! I actually started out as a replacement counter-hire. This was in 2014 and at the time I was working in management at a large cosmetics company. No experience in jewelry whatsoever, other than wearing it, of course. One of my regular customers was Lysa Taylor, who at the time was the main piercer at Industrial Tattoo & Piercing in Berkeley. At this point, I’d already gone up and down and plateaued in the company I was with, so one day when Lysa came in to stock up on some facial moisturizer, I said, “Hey, you guy hiring over there?”… I suppose the timing of everything worked out. I am and have always believed that things happen for a reason. To make a long story short… I went from the top of the totem pole at this corporate company to scrubbing toilets, taking out the garbage, and cleaning up after bums outside of this piercing studio off of Dwight and Telegraph in Berkeley. Albeit, one that I’d frequented for years. I’d learned a lot about the industry in those first couple of years. Safe practices, jewelry types, sizes, materials. It was a HUGE growing point for everyone and everything and the studio and the industry in general. Social media wasn’t even a thing, yet. Nobody was taking good photos of jewelry and regularly posting to platforms like Instagram. Shortly after starting, I took over their social media and started experimenting with composition of how to post jewelry to look good and fun. I became fascinated with how light bounced off certain facets and textures of some of the designs. Having a knack for picking up and learning computer software, it wasn’t long before I’d downloaded CAD freeware to begin playing with 3D shapes and realizing my own designs.

One of the biggest bottle necks in A to Z shop operation was the amount of time it took to get jewelry from our manufacturers. We were selling jewelry faster than we could get it in our displays. I told Todd, co-owner of Industrial Tattoo & Piercing, “Dude, why don’t we just MAKE OUR OWN JEWELRY”… So we did. And literally, not knowing anything about production or manufacturing, we knew what we needed for our clients, we knew we wanted to work with gold, and we knew we had the energy to figure out the rest. I incorporated in 2015, and it’s been a huge creative endeavor since then. And definitely the most challenging experience of my life. I’ve worked alongside very talented and industrious people in this industry and have done my best to absorb as much as I possibly can. When people say they put their blood, sweat, and tears into something… I quite literally know exactly what that means. I tell people all the time that the main reason why I started Regalia was because I just wanted to make things… What people don’t see or understand is just how difficult it is to start, run, and maintain a gold body jewelry company that doesn’t outsource production to other countries, in the state of California. Proud to say we’re about 99.9% in-house production at the cost of sleepless nights and sound mind. I’ve gotta say, it does make it worth it when people see, appreciate, and share those values with others and go on to wear our designs.

Pin Crimp tool by Regalia Jewelry.

The Point: Regalia has some very interesting and unique pieces. How do you stay ahead of the game when there are so many similar types of companies?

Regalia: I’ve heard we’ve got a distinct ‘look’ from some of our clients. This is a fun compliment for us, for sure. In my mind, staying “ahead” of the game is a little bit of a trap. It’s a type of hamster wheel that we’ve got one foot on and one foot off. Something that I think Regalia has started to achieve, kind of accidentally, is creating a type of new-classic? If I could say that as cliche as it sounds. When I design something, part of me is concerned that it’ll look cheap or that it may in the future “look like its trying too hard”. Timelessness, in my opinion, is hugely important and probably comes from my own rebellion against a system that feeds off of “Oooh whats the next new thing?”, but how do you create something or a brand that isn’t typecast into someone else’s trash box? I actually think about this a lot and realize I’m overthinking it, I shake it off, and just keep moving forward. What you see in our production line is the result of that thought process. Another thing that I consider is what something will look like at different distances and how different textures break up and distribute light. Many designs don’t translate that well depending on where the observer is observing from. Many don’t know realize this, but the designs we have for sale are literally JUST A FRACTION of the designs that most of which haven’t made it to our production line. I have folders and folders and folders of literally hundreds of design files that are unfinished, or have been finished, but that never made it to cast. 

And while yes, there are a lot of smaller gold body jewelry companies popping up every single year, a part of me naturally experiences concern, but then I remember how we started, our principles, how we make things, where we make them, and why we make them comprises the unique fingerprint that is Regalia. Design-led jewelry purchasing is a big hook, but people need to know that they aren’t just buying something that shines a specific way. They’re buying a brand, they’re buying our crew, and they’re buying our values. When I talk about Regalia I notice that I get very passionate about these things as I believe it’s up to us as manufacturers to enrich our industry and educate our clients and their clients to retain the values of what they adorn themselves with. And while it’s very possible to get washed up in these fickle trends, I’ve never wanted for Regalia to outgrow our principles; This has proven to be one of our biggest challenges, but one that is at the core of who we are. These other companies will experience their own hardships like we have and still do and if they’re still around after all is said and done, and they’ve added value to the industry instead of just profited off of it, what more can be said than, “Welcome to the players circle”. I still feel like we’re outsiders achieving our stripes. Not sure if or when that feeling will ever go away, but whenever I see a beautiful photo taken of someone wearing our jewelry in a different part of the world, those stripes feel tiny.

The Point: Where does your inspiration come from when creating your designs? Is there someone or something that inspires you?

Regalia: My inspirations come from really everywhere… pictures, paintings, architecture, the occasional *cough* video game, nature, and of course suggestions from the Regalia crew and colleagues in or out of the industry… there have even been times that the NAME of the design inspired and came before the finished piece. Imagine that. Philosophy is also a huge inspiration to me. There have been moments where the meaning of words have inspired the look of certain designs. There’s literally no shortage of inspiration or creative energy that can be found in this industry, so a bigger challenge is finding the time to dedicate to bring things to fruition. As far as WHO inspires me? The industrious inspires me. There isn’t even one specific person, but more so the TYPE of person that inspires me is the ‘doer’. Anyone can have the next brilliant idea. Those are all a dime a dozen. The type of person that inspires me is the person that can execute their idea and see it through to its completion with intentional focus and vigor. Focus and dedication are two qualities that I consistently find in the people that I’m inspired by. These kinds of people are rare. I’m sure if you’re reading this, you can think of someone in your life that is like this. Keep them close, learn from them, and if you want to help those around you, BE THAT PERSON.

The Point: Do you have any fresh ideas that we might see around the innovators booth at next year’s APP conference?

Regalia: Currently, I’m focused on getting our Pin Crimp re-designed and manufactured. That said, we might try for the creative innovator’s award if that’s being run again. We’ve got some designs up our sleeves.

The Point: Do you have any other plans for the future? What can we expect to see from Regalia next?

Regalia: We do have plans of more limited drops and one-off designs. So keep an eye open for those!

Find Regalia Jewelry on the web!
Website: https://regalia.jewelry/
Instagram: @regalia.jewelry

What I wish I knew
about opening a
piercing shop.

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about opening a
piercing shop. read Business Practices, Lifestyle


By Lola Slider, Forest Piercing, Glasgow

They say sixty percent of new business fail in the first 3 years. As my
studio approaches it’s 3 year anniversary, I wanted to look back over this
time and compare it to the 9 years prior I spent working in someone
else’s business, and share some of what I’ve learned about that transition from
independent piercing contractor to business owner.

Going it Alone…

Are we ever really alone in our endeavours? Are we ever truly without help and
support? Opening your own business it can feel like nobody understands what
you’re trying to do but each year I look back at that time, I better appreciate
the support I did have. When I quit my old job, my colleagues from Blue Lotus
Body Piercing, Nici and Adam, were right there at my house the next day,
having made the 2 and a half hour drive from Newcastle to offer me a job while
I found my feet.

When licensing delays at my local council created a black hole in my finances,
another local business (that’s no longer operational) let me use their studio
space for a couple of weeks having literally never met me, but taking it on
good faith that I was “OK”. And in the absence of physical help, I had a few
colleagues around the world telling me not to give up. I appreciate now in a
way that I couldn’t back then that when I felt most isolated I wasn’t actually
alone.

First of all you don’t know shit…

For a lot of piercers who held roles like I did in my previous job, managing the
piercing side of a tattoo business, you think you know it all. Trust me because I
say this with love: you don’t know shit. Oh, we know piercing, inside and out.
We know stock management, we know how to work a budget, for those of us
who import stock we understand that process, we understand shipping and
delivery issues and we understand client care.

None of that can prepare you for what’s it’s like to deal with gas, water,
electric, internet, phone lines, council, landlord, surrounding neighbourhood
business issues, insurance and the list goes on.

The administrative side of running a business is massively downplayed,
particularly in a country as tied up in red tape as the UK, and it’s not
something most of us are trained to do, with many of us having no formal
education in business management. So we learn as we go, and learning as you
go is an expensive process.

One of the hardest lessons I learned after opening Forest was that you can’t
work harder than someone else’s incompetence. Business to business
providers are going to perform their services poorly and as a result your
business will suffer. Today alone I dealt with two separate shipping companies
and a clinical waste company, all three of whom have failed to meet their
contractual obligations to my business, none of whom could provide speedy
resolution…and it’s just an average Wednesday.

This is an unavoidable truth and one that’s tough to swallow, because as
piercers we hold ourselves to such a high standard. Our studios are the
biggest manifestations of who we are as professional piercers so when there
are elements we aren’t happy with, that we can’t control, it’s tough for us to
accept it and not see it as a deep personal failing.

Working with others…

Working with others and having someone work for you are very different
things. Possibly one of the hardest parts of that transition from co-worker to
employer is understanding that change. Socially, it’s incredibly difficult to
navigate, particularly seeing as so many of us come from less than perfect
beginnings in this minimally regulated industry.

We should all be working to shed the bad habits and unreasonable
expectations that where imposed on us. But despite our best efforts and
intentions, almost all of us will mess up. And that will be hard. Conversely,
there are times you need to set a standard for yourself that you’re not
prepared to move on. My advice is: give yourself some time to figure out the
direction you want to take. The first year I owned Forest, I felt like a stranger.
You have time.

You can’t compare your business to
other peoples.

Do you rent a room? Do you manage the property outright? Do you work with
other businesses in tow? Businesses face unique financial challenges and
what’s going on on the surface does not always reflect what’s going on in the
engine room. Being in a relationship with an American piercer who owns their
own business, something I’ve had to make peace with is that no matter how
hard I work, we will never be compensated in a comparable way. I will always
have to put in 150% to match their 100% not because of their superiority or
my inadequacy, but because of global economic differences that neither of us
can control.

Owning your own business, you are so much more exposed to sudden
economic hardship. In the 3 brief years I’ve owned Forest, there’s been a
global pandemic, PPE tripled in price, the prime minister tanked the value of
the pound (£) and the cost of living crisis has seen gas and electric bills
increase 400% (so far). When these things happen, business directors of
Limited Liability Companies take fewer dividends or if you’re a Sole Trader like
me, you go back to minimum wage. But at least you can’t get fired! So that’s
something.

You were wrong & You were right.

Owning your own business gives you the insight to appreciate the times in the
past that your demands couldn’t be met and why they couldn’t be met. You
also learn when they totally could have been met, but weren’t. Pulling back
that curtain opens up a world of opportunity but at a world of cost, and the
beauty of owning your own business is really getting the final say in where
money is spent, what precious little of it there is.
In the end though, you grow something that’s yours, and it might not be your
exact vision but it’s a version’s of that vision.

In summary, know this: you don’t have to do everything all at once. You don’t
have to offer everything all at once. Advice from others helps, but you’re the
only one walking in your shoes. There are far more people willing you to
succeed than wishing that you fail. Always pay your taxes, and lastly never
ever pick a fight with a jewellery company

2022 Board of Directors Election

Comments Off on 2022 Board of Directors Election read BoD Elections, Membership

Another APP Board of Electors election is happening right now and is going on until December 1st!

Your vote matters! If you are a Business Member or Business Member At Large in good standing then you are eligible to vote. Check your email for more information or view the candidate biographies and vote through your member portal on our website www.safepiercing.org.

It is our duty and responsibility as business members to participate in the APP elections, so make your voice heard and vote today.

Good luck to all of the candidates!