WHERE IS ARTHOUSE TATTOO LOCATED?
We are located at 15409 Ranch Rd 620 N, Austin, TX 78717. The address can also appear as 15409 FM 620 N. When asking for directions, make sure that the destination address shows the North bound! We’ve had maps app take unsuspecting few in the opposite direction entirely, so worth double-checking. If you see an adorable two story grey house with signage on it in front of you, – you are here! Private studio, artist owned and operated. Oh, and the OG Arthouse one, – worth mentioning only because the name has been borrowed a few times since.
WHAT IS A CUSTOM TATTOO?
A custom tattoo is a one-of-a-kind piece of body art that exists as a single version of a design, developed uniquely for you, and designed with your physique and anatomy in mind. Think of it the same way as a custom-tailored suit. Your measurements, fabric, color and hardware preferences are applied to the piece. It fits you perfectly, but may look entirely out of place on someone else. Makes sense, right? You become a co-designer and co-collaborator rather than simply a consumer. Your vision is brought to life just the way you wanted it (if not better!). It also becomes a collectible, wearable piece that no one else has. At ArtHouse Tattoo, in a career spanning 30+ years, Mike has developed his own approach to custom work across a wide range of styles, from Japanese and American traditional to Celtic / Norse and more.
WHAT IS THE PROCESS FOR GETTING A CUSTOM TATTOO?
It starts with an in-person consultation, where you tell Mike what you have in mind and bring along any reference that helps explain it. From there he’ll suggest a style, a theme, and a few ways the composition could go. Once that’s settled we book your first appointment, and Mike starts working on the design. You’ll see it a day or two ahead of your appointment, and if something about it isn’t sitting right, that’s the moment to say so and talk it through with him.
WHAT IS THE STUDIO LIKE?
Actually, the name ‘ArtHouse Tattoo’ already tells you a lot about what the studio is like! It is a renovated real two-story house built in the 40s that, like many things in Austin, was uprooted and moved here, in this case all the way from West Texas. We want to think we’ve done really well by it, keeping a lot of its original features and recreating others to showcase its personality. Good coffee, good music, incense, Mike’s paintings on the walls for sale. Somewhere between a tattoo studio and a working artist’s space. Private and quiet. Nobody gets tattooed in front of an audience. Your time with Mike is sacred, and yours only. Unmistakably Austin. Oh, and haunted! Nothing dramatic has ever happened, but some of the previous owners never left. They’re friendly, and we remember to say ‘hi’ first thing coming in. They can get a bit loud sometimes, maybe when they’re not in the mood.
HOW MUCH DOES IT HURT?
Imagine pricking a fingertip as a child. Even that wasn’t fun, remember? So yes, getting tattooed hurts, though nowhere near as much as people brace themselves for, and the amount varies so much from one person to the next and one spot to the next that giving you a number would be meaningless even if a number existed. Some areas are much more sensitive, some less so, and your pain tolerance level is at play here, too. However, a ribcage is a ribcage no matter how tough you are.
Interestingly enough, almost no one mentions that the artist has a great deal to do with it. Picking the right needle configuration and the right machine for the job, going at a certain speed, having a technique developed over decades rather than learned off of Youtube, knowing how deep the ink has to be delivered and going exactly that deep and no deeper… Less damage means less pain in the chair and a faster, easier heal afterward. More damage means the opposite, and at the worst end of it you get scarring, those raised ridged lines you can feel with a fingertip. That’s a permanent skin damage that doesn’t go away even under laser if a tattoo becomes a regret later. The ink can be lifted, but the scars will remain, – something you should know while doing your research and picking your artist.
Oh, and some of it is just your artist’s hand. The same way one nurse gets the vein and you hardly notice and the next one leaves a bruise for a week, both of them fully qualified and neither doing anything wrong. One has an easy hand, and one doesn’t. All combined, it plays into the experience that you get.
And if the pain factor scares you, just know we also have topical anesthetic and you’re welcome to it any time you want it, and if the work calls for it we’ll bring it up before you have to ask.
HOW MUCH DOES A CUSTOM TATTOO COST?
Stop asking chat GPT this question! Simply put: it fixes you up with most random answer pulled out from a deep sea of equally random info. It’s a bit like asking how much a car costs. Model, year, condition, upgrades, all of it plays into that number, and no one can answer it without knowing which car you mean. For a custom tattoo, size, placement, and how many sessions the work takes all move the price. Understanding that would be a good place to start.
There are artists charging by project, others charge by hour or by session. Different approach, different prices. And while you’re comparing studios, here’s something worth knowing, because nearly everyone compares the wrong thing. Quotes based on hourly and session rates give you numbers that feel like they mean something when in reality they tell you very little on their own. A custom tattoo by an artist working fast at a higher rate can come to cost less by the end than a slow one charging lower rate per hour, and you might be left with a worse tattoo for the trouble. A rate tells you what an hour of someone’s time costs. It says nothing about how many of those hours the work will take, or what you’re leaving with when it’s done.
IS THERE A DEPOSIT?
There is, and right now it’s $400, but it can change without notice. What is the purpose? It holds your first tattoo appointment booking, and allows Mike to start working on your custom tattoo design. The deposit is non-refundable, and counts toward your last session, so consider it a pre-payment rather than an extra.
IS A TATTOO CONSULTATION FREE?
It is free. And it happens in person about 95% of the time, because deciding whether an artist is right for you is hard to do through a screen. You need to be in the room with the person who’s going to be putting permanent work on your body. The other 5% happens over the phone, and only if you’re physically hours away or in another state.
HOW DOES SCHEDULING WORK FOR A CUSTOM TATTOO PROJECT?
We usually book a few sessions ahead at a time, because a large piece needs to keep moving toward the finish, otherwise, it stalls rather quickly, and the next time you reach out, you tell us it’s been 6 months when in reality, two years passed. A large project requires a real commitment, and not only on appointment days. Showing up when you said you would, looking after the skin in between so that your tattoo investment heals well and fast. Two years in the tattoo world is a lot, and keeping consistency of style becomes a challenge when tattoo artist’s technique and style continue to change and evolve.
WHAT SHOULD I BRING TO A CONSULTATION?
Mostly yourself and a decent description of what you’re after. Talking it through is usually enough, and often tells us more than a picture would. What we’d rather not see is AI-generated images or a Pinterest board of saved tattoos. Both are the same request underneath, which is a copy of work that already exists, made for a body that wasn’t yours. A Pinterest collection shows trends, not originality. An AI prompt result gets a say in what kind of randomly spit out design will live on your skin from now on. Both options are quite ridiculous if you think about it, – especially considering that you came to a consultation with an idea of a custom tattoo on your mind.
IS IT BETTER TO PICK AN ARTIST WHO SPECIALIZES IN ONE STYLE?
Look for the artist whose work matches your vision of the style, not the one with the narrowest specialty. Every style gets interpreted personally at the end of the day, and there aren’t strict rules about how each one should look anymore. That perception has shifted. You’re better off finding an interpretation that represents the style to you than going to someone who only works by the book, time after time.
There’s a second thing worth thinking about, and this one usually gets totally overlooked until it’s too late. If you collect style by style from different artists, most of them aren’t looking after your skin’s prime real estate. They’re placing their piece wherever and moving on. Working with one artist who understands what you’re building means that space gets spent carefully, with a blueprint in mind for what comes next.
DO I HAVE TO BE 18 TO GET A TATTOO?
Yes, and there’s no way around it. We get asked constantly whether someone under 18 can be tattooed if a parent or guardian comes along and gives permission, and the answer is still no. Texas law prohibits anyone under 18 from being tattooed, with or without permission. Some states allow it. Texas doesn’t. Bring a valid ID to your appointment. No ID – no tattoo.
CAN I BRING SOMEONE WITH ME?
Yes, and plenty of people do. Someone for moral support, someone filming, someone who drove you and would rather not sit in the car for hours. The rule is: they need to be 18 or over as we do not allow children in the shop for obvious reasons. We do ask that you let us know ahead of the session so the space is set up for it.
WHAT IS A COVER-UP TATTOO?
A cover up is a new custom work designed to disguise, or completely cover a tattoo you don’t want anymore. People come in for every reason you can think of: something that aged terribly, a style or subject they outgrew, work they never liked from the day they got it, a name that became meaningless or too painful to carry. What’s actually possible depends on the size, the colors, and the placement of what we have to work with, which is why a definite answer about your specific tattoo only comes after Mike has looked at it. Some pieces can be redesigned and folded into something larger and considerably better. Others need to disappear entirely. Here’s our guide to cover-up tattoos if you want the longer version.
CAN YOU COVER SCARS WITH A TATTOO?
Most of the time, scars can be covered, yes. The scar has to be completely healed first, though. We suggest to let it heal and fully set in for at least 12 months. Anything still tender or red or partially healed isn’t ready. Using specialized scar creams and lotions will help it heal properly, and minimize it somewhat. What Mike doesn’t do is medical scar tattooing, where the aim is matching the scar’s color to the surrounding skin. That approach falls apart the first time you get any sun, because the skin around it changes and the tattooed color doesn’t. You’re left with a patch that used to blend and now doesn’t.
Every scar cover-up is its own custom project. The design gets built either to minimize how much the scar reads, or to take its texture and work it into the piece deliberately. Which of those makes sense depends entirely on the scar, which is why this consultation has to happen in person. Mike needs to see what exactly he’s working with.
WHAT AFTERCARE DO YOU RECOMMEND AFTER GETTING A TATTOO?
Aftercare has a huge say in what your tattoo looks like in twenty years, so it’s worth taking seriously for a few weeks!
Leave the bandage on for somewhere between 2 and 4 hours depending on the size and placement of the piece. Once it’s off, wash the tattoo gently with clean hands, fragrance-free soap, and warm water, then let it air dry or pat it with a clean towel and put on a thin layer of the ointment like Aquaphor.
For the next 3 to 6 days keep cleaning it gently three times a day (that’s every 4-5 hours) and moisturizing thinly afterward. Don’t soak it, don’t wear anything tight over it, and keep it out of direct sun. It may peel and flake and itch, all of which is normal and none of which you should pick at, however badly you want to.
After that, moisturize once or twice a day for another week or two until it’s fully healed. Try to stay out of the sun as much as possible, because sun fades tattoos faster than anything else does.
If something looks wrong while it’s healing, call us. We’d much rather hear from you early. Here’s our full guide to tattoo aftercare.
CAN I SHOWER, WORK OUT, OR SWIM WITH A NEW TATTOO?
Shower, yes, and you should. Wash it while you’re in there. The water needs to be room temperature rather than hot, and keep the shower quick. Swimming is out for at least two weeks, until the tattoo is at least partially healed. Chlorine and salt water are no friends of fresh work. Workouts, give it about three days. That’s roughly when healing starts and a new layer of skin begins coming in, and it looks a bit like thin plastic. Once you’re back at it, be careful and selective about what you do. Anything that stretches the skin over the tattoo or risks scraping that new layer can set you back. One more thing people don’t think about: if you live with pets, keep the fresh tattoo away from fur and anything else that could contaminate it while it’s healing.