Tattoo: cosmetic procedure, make-up or business?

Taisiya Milic , Head of the Specialized Curriculum Development Department of the International Association of Permanent Makeup Professionals, Member of the European Research Association of Educational Psychologists ScienceInternational School of Practical Pedagogy (ISPP)

Art with history (continued, start here )

Tattoo as a cosmetic procedure

Continuing a cursory tour of the history of underwear painting, let's dwell on a topic that is closer to all readers and connoisseurs of permanent makeup.

The first to use the tattoo as a cosmetic procedure was the oculoplasty surgeon Crow Baird. In 1893, he made a tattoo that replenishes the volume of eyelashes around the eyes of a patient with complete alopecia. So far, this was an isolated case, and they forgot about the tattoo again.

Time passed, the standards and criteria of beauty changed. The fashion for the shape of the eyebrows was changing, more and more simple housewives wanted to be like actresses and film stars. Having permanent makeup and always looking great became the dream of many beauties of that time.

Permanent makeup instead of cosmetic makeup began to be used in Taiwan and the United States almost simultaneously. Only in the USA such a tattoo was called "cosmetic tattoo", and in Taiwan - "permanent makeup". In Europe, Pati Pavlik, a tattoo artist, was the first to make this type of tattoo in 1979. She is considered one of the founders of this trend. By 1985, cosmetic tattooing accounted for two-thirds of her work.

It is thanks to the efforts and diligence of Pati in the 90s that permanent makeup becomes a new trend in the United States. The first book dedicated to cosmetic tattooing was written by Drs. Zwerling, Christensen and Holstein in 1986 and was called Micropigmentation. The publication shows the types of tattooing and describes in detail the techniques and techniques for applying it to the lips, eyes and eyebrows. In 1989, Pati Pavlik founded the National Cosmetic Tattoo Association, dedicated to researching the science behind tattoo cosmetics.

Tattoo like makeup

With the birth of a new direction - the industry of permanent makeup - the idea of turning single attempts at tattoo makeup into a mass business is being cultivated. The production of light, low-noise and ergonomic handles and the development of a special wide palette of pigments begin.

Two technologies were proposed for the judgment of clients and specialists. The first relied on pigments that were expected to provide an effect for 6⎼10 years, and the second assumed that the effect would last for 3⎼5 years. The first technology was called "permanent make-up" (permanent make-up), the second - "semi-permanent make-up" (semi permanent make-up).
During the first decade of development and establishment of this new direction, it turned out that customers were much more interested in offering permanent beauty for 3⎼5 years, and pigments that promised effect for 6⎼10 years were forced out of the market. Naturally, there was a need to create cosmetics for permanent makeup, and not for tattoos.

The first to meet the needs of masters and their clients was the legendary American company Mei-Cha International, registered by Lyn McKinstry, which came to grips with the production of equipment and pigments for tattooing. She is the owner of many innovative patents and has received many awards in recognition of her contribution to the development of the cosmetology industry.

At the turn of the 1980s-1990s, her laboratory developed pigments of a new formulation, with finer particles of dyes to increase the dispersion of the mixture and ensure a better distribution of the pigment in the skin. This is now the widest range of offers for PM masters on the market, but then Lin made a breakthrough.

To market the new pigments, Mei-Cha has named the permanent makeup technology using the new Microcolors pigments the term micropigmentation. And thanks to the developed network of Mei-Cha distributors in dozens of countries, all the new masters who took courses in these companies called themselves specialists in micropigmentation technology, while the concept of “permanent makeup” remained in the shadows. Thus, the marketing move of the Mei-Cha company led to the first confusion in the minds of permanent makeup masters in terms of terminology.

Tattoo as a business

Since the mid-1990s, new devices for permanent make-up have entered the world market. First of all, they differed from the previous ones by a high-precision drive of the needle movement, which ensures a stable amplitude of the reciprocating movements of the needle and the absence of its lateral beats. New engineering solutions made it possible to minimize skin trauma and improve the quality of procedures. These devices are usually called professional, and the first of them was the device of the Munich company Long-Time - Liner ⎼ Сonturte make up GmbH. The device cost 15 times more than its primitive predecessors.

To explain to potential buyers the validity of the unexpected price, a marketing program was implemented to present the revolutionary nature of the new product. And they even decided to call permanent makeup performed on the new device a new term - сnture make up. The “contour make-up” technology is patented, and as components of the technological chain, in addition to the apparatus, it also includes original pigments, anesthetics, and post-procedure care products. Legally, according to patent law and ethically, only those masters who perform procedures using the entire technological chain of Long - Time - Liner ⎼ Сonture make up GmbH, starting with the device, and who have been trained according to the corresponding program, have the right to call their work "contour make-up".

The history of the development and formation of this part of the “beautiful business” is so interesting and confusing that I would like to devote a separate article to it in the next issue.

And finally, the question: did you know that in 2005 the US Army was allowed to get tattoos? There is also a separate section for female recruits who are allowed to have permanent makeup. However, there is a condition: such a tattoo is acceptable for female soldiers only if it is “conservative and its color scheme does not conflict with uniforms.”

The material was first published in Permanent No. 3(7)/2017