1 week Ago By [email protected] (Sam Lawrie)
A quirky convention celebrating the colourful world of body art and modification returns to Kent for the bank holiday weekend. The Maidstone Tattoo Extravaganza, organised by local couple Fraser and Samantha Williams, will bring together more than 100 tattoo artists for its seventh year. The three-day event will showcase work by tattooists from across the country, as well as artists from further afield.
Many of the studios participating in this year’s exhibition are based in Kent, including Clockwork Ink in Faversham , High Tide Tattoo Studio in Whitstable , Bobinski Tattoo in Ashford , Different Strokes in Dover and Gemanji Ink in Maidstone. Visitors who are keen to get inked over the weekend can book appointments with artists in advance, or simply turn up on the day and book a future appointment while browsing hundreds of custom and flash pieces of artwork. There will also be a handful of traders selling body jewellery, taxidermy, wall art, crystals, clothing, accessories and beauty products.
Kaya The Cake Lady from Gillingham and the BBQ Project from Hastings will also be serving up refreshments across the weekend. The convention began in 2017 when 52-year-old Fraser and his wife, Sam, got tired of travelling to other exhibitions and wanted to start their own closer to home. The couple, who owned a tattoo studio in Maidstone until the pandemic, have run the independently-funded festival ever since, although the event could not go ahead for two years due to the Covid pandemic.
Speaking to KentOnline in 2022, Fraser said: “[Sam] used to go to tattoo conventions and she said, ‘How hard do you think it’ll be to do one?’ and I said, ‘I dont think it’ll be that hard’ - stupidly!” “We thought, Maidstone’s a massive town and there’s a massive Kent Event Centre at the top there so let’s have a go at it. And it worked. “It went really well, we raised a bit of money for charity, all the artists were happy and so we said we’d do another one, and we just kept doing it every year.
” The Maidstone Tattoo Extravaganza takes place at the Kent Event Centre in Detling from Saturday, April 19 to Easter Monday. You can book tickets here . Tickets can also be purchased on the gate for £15.
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