Your Guide To The Freckle Tattoo Trend & Whether Or Not It's For You
We have another beauty trend on our hands and it sure is an interesting one: tattooed freckles. While icons like Pamela Anderson covered their freckles with makeup for years, the tides have turned and people are opting to lean into their freckled faces. Which is a problem for people who don't have those cute little specks of pigment across the bridge of their nose and cheeks. Are we supposed to just accept that we are freckle-less and move on? No. We go out and get some of our own so we can be en vogue too, of course.
"Just like every cosmetic procedure people get, there are tons of varying reasons why you would want freckle tattoos," cosmetic tattooer Michelle Landis told Byrdie. "Most people love how cute a dusting of freckles looks on their face. Some people like to get their astrological constellation tattooed on."
While realistic faux freckles can be applied with makeup, it takes practice to get them just right and every morning you have to reapply them all over again. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but some people don't have the time for faux freckle maintenance. If you love the look of freckles but don't have any in sight, then maybe getting those puppies tattooed is exactly what you need to make your sun-kissed-face dreams come true.
What are freckle tattoos?
Although freckle tattoos are indeed tattoos, they don't have the same permanence as other tattoos you'd get on other parts of the body, because they don't involve the same type of coloring substance. "Even though it is a tattoo, the process is a little different," cosmetic tattoo artist Zeta told InStyle. "The pigments used are different from ink for body tattoos. The freckles are created using the same pigment that's used for eyebrow microblading, and they are hand-poked." It's this hand-poking technique that gives the freckles a more natural appearance than if they were done with a tattoo gun.
This also means that freckle tattoos are semi-permanent and will fade within one to three years, depending on the original shades of the pigments that were used, your skin type, exposure to the sun, and other lifestyle-related factors. Tattoo artist Zeta suggested getting your freckles freshened up around the two-year mark, give or take, based on the status of their appearance.
What to consider
For starters, if you get freckles tattooed on your face and don't like them, you're stuck with them for at least a year, if not longer. So that should be your first concern. While tattoo removal is always an option, based on the way the procedure can damage the skin, this isn't something you want to have to do, especially on your face.
There's also the fact that although they will fade over time, you have no control over how these freckle tattoos will do that. "They will absolutely change," dermatologist Ava Shamban, MD told New Beauty. "The body senses tattoo pigment as a foreign body like a splinter and works hard to eliminate it. So, the macrophages, the skin's clean-up committee, cart off the pigment, lightening the tattoo." That color could end up being one that you don't want on your face — unless, of course, you were hoping for them to eventually turn blue or pink.
As much as facial freckles are a big tattoo trend at the moment, it's not one that you don't want to think long and hard about before getting them done. Sure, they're only semi-permanent, but they're still a commitment and one that's right in the center of your face.