Ouch again! 2nd attempt at scaffold piercing
At A Glance Author rkn Contact rkn@bme.anon When It just happened Artist Cathy Studio Chioko Location Camden, London, UK Camden High Street – once a central point of alternative London – now becoming more and more a trendy shopping mall, it is still rife with piercing studios, many of them awful but some of them great. Having visited a few studios in Camden and across London, I think I have found the only place I will pay someone to stick a needle through me...
I had my right ear pierced for a scaffold / industrial piercing in November 2003 at what was to become my favourite (and simply put the greatest) piercing studio – Chioko (judging by the other reviews on BME lots of people agree with me). Unfortunately due to my lack of care for my poor ear (not enough cleaning and two many tugs and pulls at it – don't play with your newly pierced wounds!) I removed one of the bars it was pierced with 6 months later after it refused to settle down. Basically I had a small lump on either size of the hole which continued to be sore and refused to go away despite treatment with – salt water, tea tree oil, silver solution (and a couple of other things whose names now escape me) and a switch in the type and size of bar. I often tend to get these build ups of scar tissue on my cartilage piercings within a couple of weeks of piercing but they usually disappear after a month. My first cartilage piercing had a lump which lucky wasn't sore for a about a year before I woke up one morning and it had gone – never to return.
Fast forward a few months and two days ago I went back to Chioko (which I can't stress the greatness of enough - mostly because of the wonderful Cath – don't let her un-pierced appearance deceive you! She's great at what she does) and had my left ear pierced for a scaffold. Cath prefers to pierce two separate holes, with two separate needles and keep short bars in each for the first 3 months before changing to a long bar to help it heal – some studios put a long bar in straight away but if the holes heal at different times this could mess it up for you. So after the usual friendly chat I settled down in the piercing room (with my girlfriend for moral support) and lay back while Cath first cleaned my ear then measured out the two holes and marked them. There was only really one place the scaffold could go as I already had the top of my cartilage pierced with a small hi-polish titanium bar. Cath pointed out that this could lead to some interesting experiments with jewellery and shapes in my ear because once pierced I would have three holes which could all be integrated. Some sort of meeting of spikes (maybe septum spikes?) in the centre of the top part of my ear would look cool, with the other ends fanning out around the top of my ear – stegosaurs style!
I relaxed into the big brown comfy chair and took some deep breaths with Cath who is great at calming you down, the first needle (at the top) went through really easily and was just a small pinch (mostly form the forceps), the second had to face up to a bit of crunchy cartilage and was much more painful as it needed a bit of a push but went through fine in the end. No blood (of course!) and the pain was manageable.
I looked in the mirror as the adrenalin glow of two new piercings crept over my body, two perfect piercings and a bright pink ear! There's no rush in Chioko and I sat for a while after my piercing to chill out and let my body adapt to what had just happened.
I just hope this time I clean my ear well enough for the piercing to heal up quick and switch over to a longer bar! Chioko provide you with great aftercare instructions though I prefer to make my salt water for cleaning with loads of salt so the water becomes saturated – this does make it sting when you clean but that can only be a good thing! My girlfriend found drying off with a cotton bud after you clean with salt water is also a really good thing as it stops build ups of salt etc. around the piercing. After the salt water comes some silver solution kindly donated by Chioko which is meant to get rid of any risk of naughty bacteria growing up around the hole.
As usual it was a great experience which left me feeling great as I braved the blustery autumn winds on Camden High Street as I left the studio. Of course the piercing makes you feel great (when it's done right!) but the studio, piercer and environment all add to the experience!
22 Sept 2004