Live By The Sword Tattoo - Williamsburg — Attraction in New York

Rating 1 stars for my original piercer, Venus. I came in for another lip piercing. The piercer that I found on instagram and liked their work (who later completely mended the following situation) was with another client. Venus asks me what I was looking for and tells me that they can do it for me. I was a little hesitant because knew that I saw Xi’s work and really liked it, but still trusted the piercer as the studio in its whole has a very good rapor. From the jump I knew something was off when the piercer started making comments about my placement adjustments such as “I mean it’s the same spot but yeah.” I honestly felt unease but still knew that I had the right to speak up about how I want my service done. During the piercing, it felt really rushed and I was told not to eat noodles and to use saline spray which felt like a pretty random aftercare talk (I have several piercings but still appreciate the effort to give me another conversation about general aftercare and such). I immediately knew something was off about the piercing, but tried to brush that feeling away and still tipped 20% on top of the $80 for the piercing lol. I was walking away but my gut told me to go back because again something felt very off. The back of the piercing was hitting my teeth (I’ve had 2 lip piercings and neither have hit my teeth so excessively) and the placement/angle just looked off. I immediately go back and have never felt so gaslit before 😭. Venus tells me how we agreed on the placement with the dot she marked (the piercing was completely off center with the dot and again the general ANGLE of the piercing was so off and fully IN my actual lip rather than under if that makes sense) and other passive comments. Another piercer was backing them up saying that’s how theirs looked when it was pierced and it was just swelling. It was already really hard for me to speak up about the situation and I just felt really gaslit I don’t know. It wasn’t until Xi comes up and ask me what was wrong and I explain to them the situation. They tell me to hold tight and they’ll take a look. Once they check me out they were honestly shocked at how WRONG the piercing was. They confirmed that what I was feeling wasn’t far off and that they see exactly what I was talking about. It felt really nice knowing that I wasn’t going crazy!! They then offered to repierce me and was very reassuring. All in all, they did a beautiful job, gave amazing care and precision, and made me feel really comfortable and good. I would only go back to this location for them and a select few other piercers, unfortunately not including Venus. Had to get pierced twice to get it right but very happy I trusted my gut and that Xi was there to fix the situation. 5/5 for them but 1/5 for the...

I would like to preface this by saying this was not a review that was made in the spur of the moment. I was pierced six months ago and I have been debating putting this review up since. My experience at the Brooklyn location was really poor and, since then, the piercings I received has caused nothing but headaches.

I made an appointment in advance. I got there with my partner and he was seen immediately. His piercings took about ten minutes and his piercer was incredibly thorough.

I waited an hour as they took walk in after walk in. I went up to the counter and was ignored (they were busy, but I had literally been in their line of sight for an hour and it was evident I needed to be seen) until someone came up to me. As I was speaking, a walk-in customer came in and the woman stopped talking to me and immediately began talking to the walk-in. Turns out, they forgot my appointment after I checked in. My piercer went for lunch and took multiple walk-ins. I thought maybe they had appointments, but no.

So, they asked another piercer to "do this one quickly." Mind you, this piercer already had another client that they asked to "wait five minutes" while they did mine. When I tell you this was the fastest piercing I have ever had, I am not kidding. The entire process was five minutes at most. Furthermore, the attitude I was given felt more like I was an inconvenience than a customer. Afterwards, I was given the aftercare speech of "saline, no wet hair, and clean your pillowcase" and was whisked to the IPad where they priced me ten extra dollars and I had to correct them.

Since getting the piercings, one piercing has been infected three times and has given me nothing but pain. I did all the right things and followed the advice to a tee. I honestly feel like it has something to do with the fact that the piercing was done in 30 seconds. Furthermore, the piercings themselves are placed so awkwardly. An entire extra piercing could fit between my old piercing and the two new ones.

My partner had absolutely no problems with his piercing even though we did the exact same routine to clean our piercings every morning and night.

I have to let one of my piercings close six months later because it has become infected so many times and try to repierce it a year from now. You may say it's my issue and that I let it get infected. However, my mother is literally a nurse and advised me every day on how to clean it. I also am a very neat person and cleaned it every day for the recommended three months.

I wish I could leave a good review, but I can't in good conscience recommend this...

Update: I emailed the address that the shop owner replied with below and never got a response. Love a performative business that doesn't actually care xoxo

(also my snakebites are infected now lol thanks to this place)

Going to this shop was the worst piercing-related experience I've had. PLEASE go to a piercer listed in the Association of Professional Piercers instead.

I have been wanting to change the jewelry in my snakebites for some time, and I was nearby, so I decided there wouldn't be much harm to doing it here.

From the start, it was alarming how the piercer was handling jewelry with their bare hands (even if the jewelry was going to autoclaved). They also seemed off-put when I asked the price for the jewelry, which should be a standard question since quality jewelry is expensive. I was prepared to pay a hefty price for two pieces of yellow gold jewelry, but the cheap "deal" the piercer gave me because "they felt like being nice that day" should've been a red flag.

The piercer proceeds to painfully jam the new horseshoe barbells into my mouth, so that the jewelry is trying to poke through my lip where there is no exit hole. The piercer also had to clamp one barbell smaller while it was in my lip, but then they clamped my lip :(. They also dropped the clamp/forceps in my mouth :((. Overall, this part of the experience was more painful than when I got my snakebites pierced, or when I got them downsized twice (all at a better studio).

The worst part is that the piercer did not tighten the jewelry properly, so the ball came off the barbell within 20 minutes. I returned and got it fixed (with a new ball that was handled with bare hands and NOT autoclaved or disinfected). Then it came off again while I was still outside in the area, and I had to go back for a third time. They didn't even give a new ball this time but used the same one that fell on the ground. It's been two days since then, and the jewelry has come off again.

I was trying to be understanding about all of the above and I never said anything at the shop, but this was the last straw. I'll be needing to switch back to my original jewelry, and this entire experience has been a waste of time, money, and energy.

I will not be naming the piercer as I understand that this may be their main form of income, but I hope that the piercers at this establishment can be better trained and do not work with piercings that they are not well equipped for. I would've preferred being turned away because they didn't have the appropriate staffing over paying money for...