Here are some of the best Minneapolis tattoo artists and shops according to our research. If you think we should add anyone to the list or if you see anything that should be edited, contact us by clicking here.
Daniel Natural – Ocean Blue Tattoo
Daniel Natural is a tattoo artist in the Minneapolis area who specializes in watercolor tattoos. Daniel transfers the art of watercolor to your skin using specialized techniques that he personally developed. These proprietary techniques ensure the longevity of the tattoo and that the unique watercolor design remains vibrant long-term. Daniel Natural is a lifelong artist who enjoys the artistic aspect of the watercolor specialty because each piece allows him to create a unique design with its own artistic touch.
Jessi Lawson
David Dettloff
Jeff Marek
Julie Freeland
Rodney Taylor
Emilie Robinson
Kayden Huber
Megan Hoogland
Tattoo Styles
: Realism, Portrait, Custom
Sean Crofoot
Jacoba Kaufman
Brandon Heffron
Steven Skorjanec
Emi
Peter Harren
Steady Tattoo & Body Piercing
Tattoo Profile: We have thousands of designs to choose from and talented artists ready to help you with any custom ideas you might have. As one of the most reputable tattoo shops in Minneapolis, we’re here to help you meet all of your tattoo and body modification needs!
The Ink Lab
Tattoo Profile: The Ink Lab is a tattoo parlor located in Minneapolis, Minnesota staffed by experienced, award-winning tattoo artists and body piercers from around the world. Since October of 1995, we’ve offered a fun and relaxing environment to get your body art done in.
Leviticus Tattoo
Tattoo Profile: Leviticus is an artist owned, all custom tattoo studio located in the Longfellow neighborhood of Minneapolis. Tattoos done at Leviticus are hand drawn for each client, ensuring that your tattoo is the only one like it and just what you wanted. We have the largest reference library in the state and seven tattoo artists to help you come up with the tattoo that suits you perfectly!
Guns N’ Needles Tattoo
Tattoo Profile: Guns N’ Needles is a custom tattoo studio in Uptown, Minneapolis that is dedicated to exceptional tattooing and complete customer satisfaction. We invite you to bring us your ideas and we will help you transform them into a unique and personal tattoo. Our studio is clean and professional, yet relaxed, fun and comfortable.
Uptown Tattoo
Tattoo Profile: Founded in 1999 with an emphasis on excellence and quality, Uptown Tattoo is the premier studio for custom tattoos.
The Sea Wolf Tattoo Company
Tattoo Profile: Formed out of the notion that Minneapolis needed a shop solely dedicated to providing it’s clients with bold, bright Traditional American style tattooing. Top notch tattooing at blue collar prices.
Twin City Tattoo
Tattoo Profile: Twin City Tattoo specializes in all styles of tattoo and body piercing. We offer a full selection of body jewelry & tattoo apparel as well.
Tiger Rose Tattoo
Tattoo Profile: Tattoo Shop and Art Gallery. We are located near the corner of University and 13th Ave in North East Minneapolis.
Mutiny Tattoo & Piercing
Tattoo Profile: Mutiny Tattoo and piercing is an artist owned and operated tattoo shop serving South Minneapolis.
Mpls Tattoo Shop
Tattoo Profile: As the only female owned and operated tattoo shop in the twin cities, Minneapolis Tattoo Shop’s team of tattoo artists offer a range of styles, from traditional to realism, and has all types of custom designs. If you are looking for a top quality tattoo in Minneapolis, call or come by the shop today, our fun environment and excellent staff at Minneapolis Tattoo Shop will be sure to leave a lasting impression.
Beloved Studios
Tattoo Profile: Beloved Studios is a custom tattoo shop. We’re here to provide a friendly, safe environment for great custom tattoo work. Bring us your ideas and we’ll transform them into a reality.
Jackalope Tattoo
Tattoo Profile: Minneapolis’ premiere all-lady staffed tattoo studio! Walk-Ins Welcome. Completely custom work in a variety of styles by award winning artists.
Tatus by Kore
Tattoo Profile: Spiritual, empowering, memorial, healing tatus done in a safe and supportive environment: just for you.
Broken Hearts Tattoo Club
Tattoo Profile: Broken Hearts Tattoo Club is custom tattoo shop located in the historic Arts District of NE Minneapolis. Owned and operated by artist Scott Elke, who believes in investing in their community, the shop features professional and experienced tattoo artists and also offers cosmetic tattooing, henna, fine art installations and rotating guests artists.
What’s great about Minneapolis, Minnesota is that there are dozens of fantastic tattoo artists around the city for you to choose from. Some examples of highly-rated tattoo artists in Minneapolis include Allison Pegaroro, Emilie Robinson, Kurt Melancon, Sean Crofoot, Nikki Time, and Rodney Taylor. If you hire one of these tattoo artists, you can feel confident that they know how to listen to what their clients have to say and that they will take their time so they can be sure that you end up being happy with the tattoos that they make for you.
You might think that it would take a while to search around and find the right artist for you, but the truth is that the process doesn’t take very long at all if you know the type of tattoo that you want to get. You will see that every top tattoo artist in the Minneapolis proudly shows their work off in their online portfolios, usually both on their websites and on their personal social media pages. Once you take a look at some different profiles you should have a feel for the type of artist you want to hire. At that point it is just a matter of going into their shops to meet them to see for sure if they are the right artists for your needs.
Rather than searching for the right artist, you might instead want to try to find the tattoo shop in Minneapolis where you think you will be most comfortable. There are over a 100 highly respected tattoo studios in the Minneapolis area, but you can narrow down the list much quicker if you do some research. You can ask people you know if they have gone to any local shops and what they think of them or you can go online and visit some shops’ websites. You will want to find a tattoo shop in the city that has good ratings, is clean, and is known for hiring top talent.
One example of a very highly rated tattoo shop in Minneapolis that everyone seems to love is Jackalope Tattoo. You will be hard-pressed to find a friendlier shop than this one. Not only that, every artist you’ll run into at Jackalope is extremely talented and they all bring something different to the tattooing game. On top of all of that, the shop is always kept in immaculate shape, so anyone who worries about cleanliness in tattoo shops will be happy right when they walk through the doors.
Regardless of your tattooing needs, you should be able to find a great artist to make your tattoo for you and a shop that you feel comfortable in. Minneapolis has a long list of great studios and artists, so you should feel confident that you will end up with a great tat. It’s just important that you do the necessary research beforehand to ensure that you end up working with people who you get along with and who will do an amazing job on the design that you want.
Minneapolis is the largest municipal in the state of Minnesota and is sitting at number 45 on the largest cities in America list. Minneapolis has an estimated population of around 425,000 people with the neighboring suburbs consisting of 3.6 million others. Minneapolis is surrounded with its waterway sources. Located right at the tip of where the Minnesota River intersects with the Mississippi River, Minneapolis is on a flat stretch of terrain. There are sixteen lakes inside the city itself although some are small and shallow, the ones that are the smallest normally freeze over easily and are seen as layers of ice during the winter months. Because of the abundance of water throughout the region, the settlers of Minneapolis cleverly used the landscape to their advantage. Minneapolis has a humid continental climate. This means that the city experiences all four of the season changes and temperatures. It is warm in the summer, cool in the fall, very cold in the winter, and starts to warm back up again in the spring. The Minneapolis region is also the second largest economic center in the Midwest, Chicago topples Minneapolis as the number one largest economic center in the Midwest.
History
Before any of the European explorers ever stepped foot on the land that is now Minneapolis, the Native American tribe the Dakota Sioux inhabited the area. It was not until around 1680 that the first French settlers stumbled upon the region. This land was quickly turned into a grounds for fur trading with the rivers being used for transportation. In 1819, the United States Army built Fort Snelling. This fort attracted merchants, sellers, buyers, ultimately helping the area grow and become more civilized. The United States then pressured the Dakota Sioux to sell their land to them. After this happened, people from the East were now allowed on the land to settle there. In 1867, Minneapolis was officially incorporated as a city. This same year the railroad service began transportation between Minneapolis and Chicago.
Minneapolis was built solely around the Saint Anthony Falls. The Saint Anthony Falls was the highest waterfall in Mississippi and was used as a primary source of power for the industries that were built along the river. The lumber business was booming in the early years of Minneapolis and the waterfall was one of the best ways to convert the power of the falls into energy for the numerous sawmills that were being constructed. Flour mills, woolen mills, iron works, railroad machine shops, and other mills designed to supply materials such as cotton, paper, and planing wood. Due to the great success of using the water as a means of energy, Minneapolis was described as being one of the greatest waterpower sources that the world has ever seen.
Arts and Culture
Seeing as how Minneapolis is such a large city, it is no wonder that have so much culture. For those interested in the arts, Minneapolis has a great art center. This center is called the Walker Art Center. Named after the founder, Thomas Barlow Walker, this art center started out as just a simple, personal art gallery inside of Walkers home in 1879. Years later in 1940, the art gallery switched it position and became the official Walker Art Center and expanded its gallery immensely. Now to this day, it is the most visited contemporary art museums in America. This art center gets an upward amount of around 700,000 people each year, it is also home to over 13,000 pieces of art that include books, costumes, paintings, photography, sculptures, prints, and much more.
Since the mid 1800’s, Minneapolis has been a city that indulges in the performing arts. Minneapolis has performance venues that date back as far as 1890. Historic venues such as the Pence Opera House, the Grand Opera House, the Metropolitan Opera House, Academy of Music, and the Lyceum are just a few examples of the performing venues available. Next to New York City, Minneapolis is the second city in the United States with the most theaters per capita. Minneapolis even has the third largest theatre market in the U.S. next to New York City and Chicago. This is very impressive to have this many theaters and performing arts centers for a city its size.
Not only is Minneapolis home to a ton of different performing arts centers and venues, the city is also known for being the third most literate city in America. This means that a majority of the people in Minneapolis are well educated in the english and reading department. With the largest literary and book center in the United States, it is no wonder that the citizens have high intelligence in reading and writing. Since Minneapolis is a big city and has always kept its principals in printing and publishing, the literary center even teaches classes for paper making, letterpress printing, and bookbinding. The center even teaches others contemporary art and traditional styles of writing.
Transportation
Minneapolis has some of the countries greatest transportation systems. Many of the residents own and drive their own cars, however it is highly suggested that they take the cities means of transportation instead. 60 percent of over 160,000 people that live and work in the city and downtown area use the cities transportation services every day. The city itself has two railways trains used for commuters. The blue line and green line are what these trains are called. Over 35,000 people use these trains on the daily. Not only do they have hundreds of taxi drivers throughout the city, busses, and train lines, they also have a means of transportation if you need to make your way out to the suburbs of the city. These trains are called the metra trains and will take you over 40 miles out of the city limits. Around 2,700 people take these trains every day for either a commute to their jobs, or just a way to get to and from the city without sitting in traffic. Although the transportation helps play a big role in the city life, not everyone decides to take the help. Minneapolis is the 27th highest ranking city in America for the citizens riding their bicycles to commute. Over ten thousand bicyclist use the bicycle lanes on the roads of Minneapolis every day.
Minneapolis, in the state of Minnesota is one of two cities, the other being Saint Paul, that create the Twin Cities. This title indicates that the two cities were once separate although close in proximity but as development and growth progressed, the two cities merged together to create one large metropolitan area. There are over two hundred municipalities that are included in this area (within over a dozen counties) however Minneapolis is the greatest and most populated. The city is split by the Mississippi River which provides Minneapolis with beautiful natural scenery and plenty of greenspace. Along with the river, there are 13 lakes located in the city attributed to the large glacier that stretched across the country tens of thousands of years ago.The name Minneapolis comes from the Dakota Sioux word for water, mni, and the Greek word for city, polis. The Dakota Sioux were the first inhabitants of the land that would become Minneapolis and are deeply integrated into the city’s history. In 1867, Minneapolis was established as a city and found itself expanding quickly because of the ability to harness waterpower from the waterfalls nearby. The labor necessary to operate the technology and the industries that came out of it attracted workers from around the country. Minneapolis is known for its city-wide support of art, music, and theater.
There is a large amount of theaters in the city that caters to several troupes of actors and diverse written works. There are a number of historic theaters as well that have been restored to provide more venues for shows and performances. The city also hosts several festivals and fairs annually to help promote the arts like the Fringe Festival, May Day Parade, and many other summer art fairs. There are dozens of regional and neighborhood parks in Minneapolis, most of which are open from early morning to midnight, allowing for hours of recreation time. The Saint Anthony Falls, the waterfall system that lies within the borders of Minneapolis, create a scenic dynamic that the city’s history is built around. The boom of the late 19th century and the ability to utilize the falls as a power source allowed the city to flourish with the introduction of sawmills, textile mills, and flour mills all powered by the rushing water. These industries built the city into the modern metropolis it has become. While providing work for eager laborers in the mills, the falls also required a series of dams and locks so that the raging water could be controlled and used more efficiently.
With the abundance of work, a diverse group of pioneers and Europeans came to live and build families in the young city. Minneapolis is well-known for its Skyway System, a series of covered footbridges for pedestrian use that spans more than 11 miles throughout the downtown area. The project began in the early 1970s and wasn’t completed until 1976. The bridge allows access to multiple buildings and businesses, ensuring that in the cold Minnesota winters pedestrians need not traverse far outdoors. Minneapolis, Minnesota has a rich tattoo history. Featuring shops such as Saint Sabrina’s, Uptown Tattoo, Leviticus, and Twilight Tattoo, Minneapolis is a great destination if you’re looking for some new ink. With a population of around 388,000, there are lots of potential customers for the parlors in town. Yelp currently lists 39 different shops when searching for “tattoo” in Minneapolis. Google Places lists 164 different tattoo shops in the Minneapolis area, which shows how competitive the city truly is. When doing research for your artist, we suggest not paying too much attention to price because quality is much more important when you’re going to be living with the artwork for the rest of your life.