You Can Get Your Tattoos Framed As Artwork After You Die

Getting a tattoo is a commitment. Having something permanently etched into your skin is not a decision you take lightly (drunkenly, maybe, but never lightly), and everything from an intricate original design to personal memorializations takes on a certain amount of significance over time. It’s a shame to let something so personal disappear in the ground with you, so a company called the National Association for the Preservation of Skin Art (NAPSA) has created Save My Ink Forever to ensure your entire art collection can be passed on.

And why wouldn’t you want it to be? According to a story in The Daily Mail, NAPSA founder and chairman Charles Hamm estimates he’s spent roughly $45,000 on his own personal body art — so it’s no wonder he devised a way to keep all of that expensive artwork from ending up cremated or buried. NAPSA employs a process whereby the water and fat found naturally in skin is replaced with a polymer that makes it more durable and suitable for framing:

After they die, relatives have 18 hours to inform Save My Ink, who post a removal kit with instructions and prepaid return packaging to the funeral home.
The tattoo is removed within 60 hours by the embalmer and sent back to Save My Ink, who return the art to the family within three to six months.

Prices start at $1,699 for a single tattoo, all the way up to $100,000 for a full body suit. Here's how the three step process is explained on their site:

1. First Contact: Individuals can contact us at any time to plan a tattoo preservation ahead of life passing. Family members may contact us prior to death and or within a few days of passing.

2. Recovery Kit: After contact we will send a recovery kit that contains all of the essential paperwork and materials for the recovery process for you or your loved ones tattoo(s). We can preserve one or all of the tattoos in question.

3. Delivery: The family can expect to receive their loved one's framed tattoo art within 3 months. Our framing artist will pair a frame to best suite the style of the tattoo, accompanied with museum quality UV glass.

It’s also not difficult to find other skin-saving services, like Walls And Skin, which claims to remove tattoos for artistic purposes and “can also be given to the relatives as a free-loan.” So if you really want to leave a piece of yourself behind forever, and you’re a rebel who plays by your own set of rules, there will always be options.