About Seattle Tattoo

Seattle Tattoo is a guide for anyone planning a tattoo in Seattle or elsewhere in Washington, whether you're getting your first small piece or planning a full sleeve.

What is Seattle Tattoo?

There are two parts:

• A studio directory covering Seattle and the rest of Washington, with locations, styles, services and links to each studio's own booking pages, plus tattoo artist profiles taken from the studios' own websites.
• Editorial guides that answer the questions people ask before getting tattooed: what it costs (price guide), what the law says (Washington tattoo laws), which style fits you (style guides), how to heal well (aftercare guide), and what each part of the city is like (Capitol Hill, Ballard, Georgetown and more).

Seattle Tattoo itself isn't a tattoo studio: the site doesn't take bookings or employ artists. It does share ownership with one studio, as explained under Ownership.

Who is it for?

The site is for people choosing an artist, people visiting Seattle who want to get tattooed while they're here, and parents or partners researching the rules. Artists and studio owners use it too, to check their listings and point clients to plain-language answers on licensing and aftercare.

What do we cover?

Seattle gets the most detailed coverage, with guides to 28 neighborhoods from Lake City to West Seattle. The directory also covers studios across the rest of Washington. Our Washington hub shows how many shops and artists are licensed in each county, using Department of Licensing open data: about 940 licensed tattoo shops and about 3,100 licensed tattoo artists statewide as of August 2026.

Ownership

Seattle Tattoo and Cleopatra Ink Seattle share ownership. Cleopatra Ink Seattle, a tattoo and piercing studio in Downtown Seattle, is the directory's one Featured listing, and wherever we promote it, it carries this disclosure: "Featured: Seattle Tattoo and Cleopatra Ink Seattle share ownership." It is not an Editor's pick, and its listing is built from the same sources and rules as every other studio. Cleopatra Ink's Tacoma and Vancouver studios don't share ownership with Seattle Tattoo. Read how featuring works.

How do we keep the directory fair?

Our editorial content is not for sale. Being featured never changes a studio's description, our Editor's picks or the advice in our guides, and the studio we share ownership with gets no different treatment in the facts we publish. We cite primary sources such as state law, licensing records and medical guidance so you can check our work. Our methodology explains how listings and artist profiles are built and checked, and our editorial policy covers sourcing, AI use and corrections.

How do I contact the team?

Use our contact page to report an error, suggest a guide or ask a question. Studio owners can claim or update a listing at /add-your-studio.