woman in gray shirt was tattoos and piercings

Discover expert tips to ensure your new tattoos or piercings heal quickly and beautifully. 

If you’ve got new tattoos or piercings and want to help them heal as well as possible, you’re in the right place! We’re here with some tips about how you can best look after your new body art or piercing in order to help it heal well and as quickly as it can. The main thing is to choose a reputable tattoo artist or piercer and then follow the advice that they give you about the aftercare, as it will be specific to you and the piercing or tattoo you’ve had. However, we’re here with some overall tips to help give you a refresher! From washing your tattoos properly and staying out of the sun through to tips to help you avoid sleeping on cartilage piercings, we’ve got it all covered. So, let’s get into it and help you to have healthy tattoos and piercings that heal as you want them to. 

Tattoos

Wash With Soap and Water Three Times A Day

Firstly, when you’ve got a new tattoo, you should wash it three times a day with a mild soap and water. This will help you to ensure your tattoo heals quickly and creates the effect you want it to, as well as preventing infection, which can significantly impact how your tattoo heals. It also helps to remove some of the fluid that can leave the area after you’ve had your tattoo. 

Keep It Wrapped

When you’ve had your tattoo, your artist will wrap it in cling film. You need to keep your tattoo wrapped 24 hours a day, for 48-72 hours (depending on what your artist advises). Once you’ve washed and dried your tattoo, you will need to rewrap it everytime. It’s also important that every time you’ve sweated at all doing cardio training or gotten quite warm, that you wash it and rewrap. Make sure that before you reapply the wrap, that you’ve let the area air dry completely. 

Apply Cream/Moisturiser

After you’ve stopped wrapping your tattoo, you will need to start applying cream or a moisteriser. It’s usually recommended that you use a specifically designed tattoo aftercare cream for the first few days after you stop wrapping, as it usually contains some form of antiseptic to help with the healing. After this, it’s common to use things like nappy cream or any gentle moisteriser. This is really important to help heal the skin and also result in the tattoo healing well and looking fantastic afterwards. 

Stay Out Of The Sun

Something else you need to do is prevent any exposure of the tattoo to the sun for around 4 weeks. When a tattoo is exposed to the sun too early, it can fade very quickly, and also as the tattoo will not have yet fully healed, it can be more prone to blistering, damaging both your skin in general as well as the tattoo. So, protect it for at least a month, then make sure you always wear SPF, as you would anywhere else that is exposed to the sun! 

Piercings

Choose Solid Gold Or Sterling Silver Jewellery 

When you get your ears pierced, it’s vital that you have them pierced with either solid gold or sterling silver jewelry, which any reputable piercer would naturally do. This is because they’re durable, long lasting and they’re also hypoallergenic and good for sensitive skin, which makes them well suited to new piercings. It’s also important that when you change your piercing, that you change them to solid gold or sterling silver, as again this helps to prevent irritation or infection. Make sure you clean them thoroughly before changing as well, even if they’re brand new! 

Clean Twice Daily 

You should also clean your piercing twice daily for 6-12 weeks after you’ve had it done. Either buy a piercing cleaning solution from your piercer, or you can create your own by combining 1 cup of boiling water with ¼ teaspoon of sea salt, allow it to dissolve and cool and then use it to clean your piercings. Use a cotton bud to really get close to the piercing. Without doing this, it’s common for piercings to get infected which can be really uncomfortable, even painful, and can result in you having to have your piercing taken out. So, make sure to do this and it will help your piercing to heal quicker so you can start getting creative with funky flat back earrings or daith earrings quicker! 

Don’t Twist

It can be really tempting to twist new piercings, however it’s important that you don’t. You shouldn’t touch new piercings at all unless your hands are thoroughly clean and you’re in the process of cleaning them, as it can easily cause them to get infected. There’s also no reason to twist your piercing, as it can damage the delicate skin that needs the time to heal. So, both of these things contribute to show that you shouldn’t be twisting your piercings! 

Avoid Sleeping On Your Piercing

This one is more important for any piercings you’ve had in your cartilage, however it’s really key that you don’t sleep on your piercings. When you’ve had something like a helix, industrial, snug, inner conch, tragus, daith or forward helix piercing and then sleep on it, when they’re new they can actually migrate quite easily and move into a slightly new spot by stretching the piercing. Not only does this not look good, but it can also be quite painful. So, you need to avoid sleeping on your cartilage piercing to fully heal, which usually takes 3-6 months. 

A good way to get around this if you like sleeping on your side is to get a travel pillow with the gap in the middle, then sleep with your ear in the middle of that, so you can still sleep comfortably but also keep your new piercing in the best condition possible and also help it to heal quickly. This is a simple but effective trick that can really make a difference when it comes to your piercings and how they heal.