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Greetings, internet! It’s Livia Michael again. Here at Speakeasy Tattoo in Los Angeles, I am learning so much about the history of tattoos and iconic tattoo artists. There are many names that come up frequently when you research tattoo history - Samuel O’Reilly, Charles ‘Charlie’ Wagner, Norman ‘Sailor Jerry’ Collins, and Ed Hardy, to name a few. But I have seldom found one particular tattoo artist’s name in this rotation: ‘Lew the Jew’ Alberts. In a previous blog, I mention

Hi again, internet, it’s Livia Michael! As you all know, I am the newest apprentice at Speakeasy Tattoo here in Los Angeles. The word, ‘apprentice’ is thrown around a lot on this blog. But what exactly is a tattoo apprentice? A tattoo apprentice is a student learning the craft of tattooing from a mentor that is a licensed, practicing tattoo artist. Every tattoo studio and artist is different, and therefore every apprenticeship is unique in its requirements, cost, and timelin

Hey, y'all! I'm Livia Michael and I am a self-proclaimed history nerd. Here at Speakeasy Tattoo in Los Angeles, I've been delving into the rich history of tattoo. In the current day and age, tattooing has mostly broken into the mainstream in Western culture. Though some remain prejudiced to the practice for an array of reasons, tattooing in its many forms is here to stay. From the late nineteenth century until the middle-to-late twentieth century, tattooing in the Western wor