Editor’s Note: This story was initially published on March 23, 2009.

Tattoos are permanent; Jaded Angel advises clients to push their imagination and think outside the box.

Bob Parr, owner of Jaded Angel, 122 Welch Ave Floor 2, said the main thing his tattoo business tries to do is allow clients to bring in their own designs or ideas but let each piece leave with a unique inked spin that fits their skin perfectly.

“A lot of people have misconceptions that tattoos should look a certain way and you know, should be of a certain style and can only be certain things, but we are trying to push the boundaries and trying to have people think outside what they already know about tattoos,” Parr said.

Parr said clients should not be afraid to come in with their own original artwork and let the tattoo artist interpret it for his or her body structure.

Parr said since every body is different, he sometimes draws the tattoo on the skin. “That gives a better sense of the person’s actual muscle structure and you know, helps the design fit better on their body,” he said.

Parr graduated from Iowa State in 1999 with his fine arts degree. He said he tries to apply what he’s learned to his every day work.

“Me and the other artists here, we spend our time studying this art form and looking beyond what is [in Iowa] so we can bring newer styles to people, newer ideas and newer trains of thought just so that it’s not the same thing,” he said.

A lot of tattoo parlors have “flash work,” which are mock-up tattoo designs that hang on the wall for customers to flip through. Parr said Jaded Angel doesn’t have those because he and the other artists believe every tattoo should be custom.

“We basically draw everything up custom for each customer,” Parr said. “It’s definitely not the best way to make money, but it’s definitely the right way to do tattoos because everyone is individual. There’s no reason to have a predetermined design that wasn’t drawn custom for your body.”

Besides tattooing, Jaded Angel provides other services such as piercing and scarification, which are designs cut into the skin, and micro-dermal implants, which is a piece of jewelry that is put into the skin.

Parr said scarification is cheaper than tattoos, goes a lot quicker but is more painful. He also said it’s becoming more and more popular.

Parr said he loves the tattoo industry because of the long-lasting impact an artist can have on a person just by tattooing them.

“I get a lot of people who come back years and years later and they are like ‘Hey, remember me? You did this tattoo,’ and I’m just like, ‘Hey, yeah, I do remember you.’ It’s like a thing that connects us to our clients forever and it’s not just an artwork on the skin, it’s the permanent connection between the artist and the client,” Parr said.

“Once you tattoo somebody, they’re not just a client, but now they’re a new friend.”

Parr acknowledged that the other tattoo businesses in town have good artists and they have their own general things that they do. He said Jaded Angel also makes sure clients walk out with body art that they like.

“A lot of what we like to do is make sure that people aren’t walking out of here with the same tattoo that they could get anywhere else. If you come here, you are going to get a specific special design that nobody else is going to have,” Parr said.

He said the artists steer away from using computer fonts and each artist draws styles specifically for the tattoo they are working on.

Jaded Angel was started by Parr and Jerry Stubben, who once a professor at Iowa State years ago, but Parr has taken full ownership since February of 2008. The other tattoo artists — Lurch, Shannon Bellet and Jeff McDaniels — have been employed for a little more than a year, but have had multiple years of prior experience.