We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Charlotte Bolton a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Charlotte, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?

I am now currently earning a full time living from my creative work since being self-employed as a tattoo artist, but it has definitely taken a few years and perseverance to get to this point. Since I can remember, I knew I wanted to work for myself doing something creative, and as soon as I left school at 16 I started taking on drawing commissions to start earning a bit of money. From that point I had a bit of a chaotic time going back and forth between jobs, quitting college, then going back to finish it – just because I was unsure what I wanted to do with myself. I actually managed to get a tattoo apprenticeship when I was 18, but I quit shortly after because I was juggling too much and the time wasn’t right. I finally decided that I wanted to go to university at 21 where I studied Printed Textiles and Surface Pattern Design at Leeds Arts University, and this massively helped me in my journey to becoming self employed full time. The university was amazing for holding workshops about self employment and starting your own business, so it really prepared me for the future. There were also lots of opportunities to have stalls at art markets and sell handmade products, which really helped me in beginning my fashion brand later on. After leaving university in 2017, I did get a graduate job as a graphic designer, where I worked for a year and a half before leaving to work for myself full time in 2019. Working in the industry was invaluable, and although I was debating for a while whether to just go self employed straight away after uni, I am so glad that I took the job because I learnt so much and gained confidence in myself a designer. I saved some money before leaving my full time job so that I knew I could afford to live for a couple of months without worrying, but I did have to go back to my part time job for a few months just so I had some steady income. I was very lucky that the company I worked for previously, commissioned me for freelance work occasionally (another reason why working for someone else helped my freelance career). I was applying for countless freelance jobs, trying to get commission work, whilst also trying to build my own business at the time. It was nice being able to do a mixture of things, because if one thing slowed down it meant I could focus on putting energy elsewhere, so I’d always have something to do and some kind of back up to make money. My business grew a lot over the pandemic and I was almost making a full-time living from this, but at this point I also decided I wanted to get back into tattooing again! In late 2020 I began tattooing in a studio 2 days a week, whilst also doing freelance design and working on my fashion brand to make sure I was still earning enough money to live. Gradually, the tattooing aspect of my career took over and became my main source of income which has meant that my brand and freelance work has kind of taken the back seat. However, I can now confidently say I’m at a point where I am earning a full time living from my creative career which is amazing, but it is still really scary as there’s so much uncertainty – especially right now with the cost of living crisis. In all honesty, I don’t think I would have sped up the process, I think everything I have gone through to get to this point as been invaluable and has made me appreciate where I am now, and I fully believe that things are meant to happen at the right time.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am currently a self-taught handpoke tattoo artist from Chesterfield in the UK, but I have also previously worked as a graphic designer/surface pattern designer and owned my own sustainable fashion brand! I believe going to university where I studied Surface Pattern Design and then going on to be a graphic designer, has massively inspired the way I now tattoo. It really helped me develop my style; I love to draw cutesy, whimsical, playful animal characters and I have been able to apply this to tattooing and put them on people’s bodies forever! Before tattooing I worked on my sustainable fashion brand full time, where I was reselling secondhand/vintage clothing, reworking & handmaking clothing from secondhand fabrics and also handmaking jewellery with my sister. I’d say my proudest moment was when I hosted a 3 month pop up shop in Chesterfield town centre as part of my brand, but also selling other independent brands items on rotation – it was super hardwork, but was such a success and I’d love to organise another pop up or event again one day. It just felt great being able to support other independent brands and get their work out there.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

You feel like you’re part of a community, and it feels amazing to support other artists and help each other out. It’s also great to be able to express yourself creatively and bring there people joy through doing this, particularly in tattooing because I believe tattoos really help people to become more comfortable ad confident in their own bodies.

How did you build your audience on social media?

Social media is such a struggle, because it feels like you have to take so much time to perfect it and keep on top of it! I think a lot of the time we worry too much about how to please the algorithm and what to post, but I think this takes the fun out of it and makes it so stressful. So I guess my advice is to not put too much pressure on yourself and keep things fun! I try to post regularly and be consistent, but I don’t punish myself if I’m too busy to post anything. Tiktok is great and I feel like that’s the place to be right now for getting your work out there, and I usually just repost my tiktoks to my instagram as reels!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.depop.com/ratecute/ (my fashion brand)
• Instagram: @charlottelucyy_tattoo

Image Credits
All my own photos