Forget the dark and dingy tattoo parlors inhabited by leather-clad Hell's Angels types and their biker mamas. Body art is now being seen on the haute and hip couture runways and has moved from ink to pure gold and platinum.
The design house of Coco Chanel led the way.
Chanel designs were once worn by the ultra classy Audrey Hepburn and Grace Kelly. The design house was considered the epitome of high class with its boxy cardigan suits and little purses with chain handles and the entwined C's logo.
That Chanel chose in 2010 to market a limited edition of "temporary skin art" is a testament to how far tattoos have come, or perhaps how far Chanel has come since the days of chic Hepburn and Kelly. Before the tattoos, Chanel had already ventured into boomerangs, scooters and bicycles.
Could tattoos really be far behind?
Once tattoos were given the approving nod by Chanel, singer and mega-star Beyonce teamed up with Temptu, an airbrush makeup company, to launch her own line of temporary tattoos under her mother's Dereon label.
In Dubai, the playground for the incredibly rich, Precious Skin is offering temporary 24-carat gold tattoos for special occasions with a price tag from $50 to $5,500.
Chanel Transformed Tattoos Into 'Temporary Skin Art'
Chanel took the increasing popularity of temporary, peel-and-stick tattoos and had Peter Philips design a Chanel version for the haute couture runway.
The "temporary skin art" has been sold as Les Trompe L’Oeil de Chanel Temporary Skin Art since the spring of 2010.
The tattoos of chains with entwined "C"s were created for the spring show in Paris.
Chanel is marketing a limited edition of 55 peel-and-stick tattoos for $75 U.S. or about $49 British pounds. The tattoos are available at the website and in Chanel boutiques.
Chanel's venture into tattooing was covered by news outlets around the world, including the New York Daily News, Elle and Allure magazines, and online at TrendHunter.com and many other websites.
Beyone's Temporary Tats are Also Limited Edition
In the fall following the introduction of Chanel's temporary tats, Beyonce Knowles modeled for House of Dereon and wore her own temporary tattoos.
Her mother, Tina Knowles, founded Dereon and is the creative director and designer there. A Sun Sentinel blog quoted Tina Knowles, "With a sixties-pinup-girl-meets-futuristic-biker-chick theme, Beyonce and I really wanted to give our Dereon fall 2010 campaign a tough edginess."
The two had Temptu to create the body art for Beyonce to model with the Dereon fashions, then liked the results so much, they decided to market the tattoos to their customers.
Beyonce's tattoo kits are available in two sizes, basic at $16 and deluxe at $34, at Sephora stores, Temptu.com and Dereon.com.
Precious Skin Offers 99.9 Percent Gold and Platinum Temporary Tattoos
On the Persian Gulf where henna tattoos often adorn women as fashion statements when they party or attend special functions, the company Precious Skin has developed a technique of applying 99.9 percent gold and platinum foil to the skin as impermanent tattoos that last about a week.
Precious Skin has two locations in Dubai and a goal of adding 23 more in Dubai and expanding to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Bahrain in the coming year.
According to the November 11, 2010 Reuters story, "Glam in the Gulf: Get a Glitzy Tattoo in Real Gold," by Amena Bakr, one of Precious Skin's locations is in the famous sail-shaped Buri Al Arab hotel in Dubai.
Tattoos in gold and platinum are "a revolution in the body art business, it's the first time we can use 24-carat gold and platinum on skin," said Arnaud Flambeau, managing director of Flambeau Luxury Trading and Precious Skin, as quoted by Bakr in the Reuters story.
The golden concept is from Japan, but Flambeau "thought the idea would catch on in the Gulf, where many women have temporary henna tattoos applied for weddings and special occasions," the Reuters article said.
The technique has the tattoos being made of a thin film of gold or platinum, then applied to the skin.
According to the Reuters story, the temporary tattoos cost from $50 up to $5,500 U.S.
Tattoos have certainly come a long way when they're dubbed "temporary skin art" and sold by a leading haute couture house such as Chanel, or the hip couture house of Dereon or applied to skin in solid gold or platinum in the heady environs of Dubai.
Velma Southerland - Velma Southerland has been employed in the lifestyles section of an award-winning East Tennessee community newspaper for more than 20 ...
