🔻DEN HELIGA GRALEN🔻
Hi there!
I'm Sofia, and I have been handpoking tattoos since 2017. I am self taught and started with a stick and poke tattoo kit while living in the forests of Värmland, Sweden.
For 3,5 years, I ran a tattoo studio in Malmö called Den Heliga Gralen (The Holy Grail). These days, I guest tattoo in other people's studios from time to time.
My motifs often depict plants and the natural world as well as symbols, but I am open to suggestions of any kind of imagery.
One of the aspects of tattooing that I find the most meaningful is to give some extra love to my tattoo client's intention behind the tattoo, if they have one. If they want me to, I bring in ritual, meditation, prayer and listening into the tattoo session in order for them to be witnessed and to connect deeper to the meaning surrounding their tattoo.
📬 Email me at den.heliga.gralen@gmail.com for any tattoo request, and please include (even if you're not 100% sure what you want)
- the imagery you'd like
- the placement
- the approximate size
- where you live
- when you'd like to get the tattoo
- and if you're interested in the ceremonial aspect.
Thank you 🙏🏼
🌛🌝🌜
💬 Q&A about handpoke tattooing 💭
Q: What is handpoke?
A: It's tattooing without a machine. I hold a tattoo needle in my hand, dip it in ink and create the tattoo dotwork-style, by penetrating the skin dot by dot to about 1 mm depth (the middle skin layer).
It's a calm and quiet process that allows for talking, resting and music because there's no buzzing machine sound.
Q: Is it painful?
A: It feels like being bit by a tiny mosquito a million times. It is slightly more annoying than painful, but after a while the skin numbs out. It is generally less painful than machine tattooing. Still, some places on the body are more pain sensitive than others (like the ribs), and people have different levels of pain tolerance as well.
Q: What is ceremonial tattooing?
A: It becomes a ceremony because of the intention carried behind it. I see tattooing as something sacred – we're permanently putting a mark on the skin, the only skin you're given in this life, and I get a person's trust to do that. That's grand. It's a process where a person's inner reality becomes visible on the outside, and I feel honored to be a part of that process. The level of ritual/ceremony in a tattoo session depends on the client's interest, and it is something that we cocreate if the willingness is there.
The three photos furthest on top of this page are taken by Cim Ek.
