Feel free to bring your favorite artist a PSL while you're at it.
According to the calendar, it's officially fall (or autumn, if you're pretending to be fancy). While it's still just as hot as it was last month in many areas of the country, the weather should be cooling down soon enough as the leaves change colors and everything becomes pumpkin-flavored.
In the tattoo world, fall is also the perfect time to get inked. Don't be one of the questionable collectors who get tattooed during the summer (more on that later), go make an appointment with your favorite artist for the next few months. Here are five reasons why you should be getting tattooed between now and Thanksgiving (and none of them are even that Halloween-themed tattoos are awesome).
Summer is Too Hot
Everyone wants to get tattooed during the summer. Why? Because people are sheep. Since the general population is wearing less clothes (tank tops and shorts instead of sweaters and jeans) during summer, folks see the tattoos of others and think they should add to their own collection. Unfortunately, summer is actually the worst time of year for most people to get tattooed, as healing a tattoo requires keeping it out of direct sunlight or submerging it in water for a few weeks. Even if you're willing to wear long sleeves and stay out of pools and oceans for the better part of a month, getting ink done during the summer also means competing with everyone else for your artist's limited time. With more people getting tattooed and the same number of hours in a day, tattooers' schedules tend to fill up quickly during the summer, and that doesn't even take into consideration if they're taking family vacations while their kids or significant others are out of school.
If you enjoy doing anything outdoorsy (or even just traveling and/or partying) during the summer months, stay away from the tattoo shop until the temperatures start to drop below your ideal hiking/camping/swimming/surfing weather.
Your Tattoo Has Time to Heal
Much like how summer isn't the most opportune time to heal a tattoo, winter tends to be a deceptively poor choice as well. For one thing, having to wear several layers of clothing to brace against the cold can often mean that the bottom layer is something snug that could potentially rub against the tattoo (which is uncomfortable at the least). The other issue is that there's often a lot more activity in the winter and spring than there is during fall.
Unless you're an avid football player (or other fall athlete), the year's penultimate season tends to be among the calmest. You won't be running around with holiday plans and scrambling through the mall to find gifts. You won't have to worry about whether your tattoo will be healed in time for your trip to Cabo for spring break. You won't even need to use your new tattoo as an excuse to break your recent New Year's resolution of going to the gym every day. If you get tattooed in the fall, you'll have the entire holiday season (and thawing out period that follows) to do whatever you need to do without worrying about a fresh tattoo. Plus, you can totally tell grandma that you've had your new tattoo for years when she judgmentally asks about it at Christmas.
Artists Have More Availability
Think about when you're busiest. It's probably during the summer when everyone wants to go places and have a good time and during the winter when you're obligated to go see family you won't talk to again until the next holiday. Believe it or not, tattoo artists have families too. Just like anyone else, they often want to go home for one holiday or another, and many tattoo shops even close for a few days in the end of December to give their artists a break (and save money on expenses since clientele tends to be busy around then too).
Add those commitments to the number of people many tattoo parlors have lining up to get inked during the summer, and your favorite tattoo artist is automatically harder to get a session with for about half of the year. We're not saying you'll get a discount or anything by booking a tattooer when they're not as busy, but they'll certainly appreciate it more.
There are Less Impending Expenses
Tattoos can get expensive. That's an undeniable fact.
Getting tattooed around the holidays means adding to the financial burden of buying gifts for other people, and ink in the spring and summer will greatly cut into your budget for heading to the beach or traveling the globe. Other than Halloween and Thanksgiving, there aren't too many big spending days during the fall, making it the perfect time to save your money for some new work.
You Can Get Another Next Year
Spring is the second-best time to get tattooed (just early enough so it's healed by summer), and getting tattooed in the fall gives you enough time to forget about how much it hurts and how annoying it is to heal a tattoo for a few weeks. You'll be ready to get inked again by March.
