Nick Rodin and the Petaluma Tattoo Scene

Walking into @Petaluma Tattoo before opening on a Thursday feels like stepping into the movie version of a tattoo shop. The kind you hope is real. Great music playing, artists trickling in one by one to set up their stations, the buzz of a room beginning for the day. @Nik Cotten, @Lauren Smith, and I got there just before the doors opened to sit down with @Nicolas Rodin, the owner. This is also the first time Porches has featured partners: @Sarah Rainey, Nick's partner, was spotlighted a while back, and getting to now feature Nick feels like a special community milestone for us.

Nick has been tattooing for 27 years. He grew up in Torrance and Long Beach in a household that always celebrated the arts. His mom, who was a nurse, was also a painter. And at just the age of 14, his aunt put him to work hand-painting tile alongside her. Rodin said, "From an early age, it was, you should try and make art for a living. That was the whole thing." That message got reinforced in high school by an art teacher who believed in showing students that art could be a job, not just a hobby. He would bring former students back to talk about their working lives as artists. One of them was a tattoo artist, and Nick, who had already been doing acrylic paintings of tattooed arms in class, was hooked. "This is what I want to do."

Around the same time, Nick went with his dad to get his first tattoo (a small mariner's cross for a life on the ocean) and was mesmerized. "It was dangerous and romantic and so cool." For his own tattoo, though, he waited until 18. His mom, the nurse, worried about garage tattoos that all his friends were getting and made him a deal. She would pay for his first tattoo if he waited until he was 18 and could get it done in a tattoo shop. He took the deal and designed his own coat of arms for it. He is still happy with how it looks.

Nick's path into the industry was pure boots-on-the-ground. He was totally in love with the world of tattooing and after a short start to art college after high school, he quit, moved back in with his parents, and made himself indispensable to a tattoo shop owner in Harbor City. "I was on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He's like, 'Oh, I need my laundry done.' Pick my friend up at the airport at 2 in the morning. I would just go. Whatever he asked me to do, I did." Six months after that, he earned the trust of giving his first tattoo in the shop. "A nautical star, this big," he says, holding his hand to show the size of a half-dollar. "Took me three hours. My hand was shaking. I was so nervous. They're like, 'I don't think you can do this. I don't think it's going to work out.'" Laughs.

He's still friends with the guy who got that tattoo, who sends him a photo of it once a year, confirming that it still looks good.

From there, Nick spent about five years in LA, then made the move that shaped everything after. Blackheart Tattoo in San Francisco, one of the most respected shops in the country, hired him. "Blackheart's name was so big in the community that if you were, 'Nick Rodin from Blackheart Tattoo in San Francisco,' they'd say, 'Oh yeah, we'll get you in the convention. No problem.'" He rode that coattail for nearly a decade, met everyone worth meeting in the industry, and started collecting the connections that fill his guest chair now (including a recent visiting artist all the way from Austria).

The move to Petaluma was supposed to be a compromise. He'd live here and commute to San Francisco or Oakland to tattoo. That plan lasted about as long as his art college career. "When I got here, I thought, oh wow, the community is very, very accessible. I really like every single person I've met since we moved here. And I want to tattoo these people. I don't want to go tattoo the people that I don't live next to." He worked at a shop in town for a few years, then opened Petaluma Tattoo. He and Sarah purchased the building and got the keys in February 2020. COVID hit weeks later.

Nick says the delay turned into a gift. "That's why the shop looks the way it does. I had four months sitting here alone, the kids playing and me and Sarah hanging flash." The building itself is a beacon of Nick's design point of view. Purchasing a building for a tattoo shop is a bit unheard of, and he had a clear vision from the start for how the exterior should read. Hand-painted signs adorn the outside, and the paint colors themselves have become iconic. That whole visual language, bold, graphic, unmistakable, is a nod to the Milan-based Memphis Group of the 1980s and carries through to his tattoo work.

What Nick has built in that space is what makes the Petaluma tattoo scene so distinctive. A high-caliber roster of artists ( @Greg Rojas has been at it 35 years and calls this his longest run at any shop; Jesse Haney, Dakota Williams, @Adrian Sanchez, and @Kahlil Rintye round it out) doing serious work in a room that hums with community. Nick brings in guest artists to keep the ideas moving. He cares about Petalumans, and it shows. He runs a big annual suicide prevention fundraiser, moving it from September to October this year, where the whole team tattoos all day and donates every dollar. "It's close to a lot of us. It makes us stand out." Local businesses donate the raffle prizes. Every year it grows.

Nick's philosophy about what he tattoos comes down to something simple. "I love stuff that looks good as a tattoo." He'll turn away hateful work, and he's careful about talking people out of decisions driven by grief or fresh heartbreak. He's proudest of what he's built with the shop and won't say what's next except that something exciting is brewing around art in Petaluma, "unfortunately too early to share." When I asked what he looks forward to now that they're six years in, he said he'd love to travel with the team, do guest spots together, get inspired somewhere new and bring it back. For now, he's running a shop that other shops model themselves after and tattooing the people he lives next to.

Lauren and I couldn't sit through an interview with a legendary tattoo artist without getting tattooed ourselves. Lauren got an arrow for her son, Arrow. I chose a small R, for my dad Robert, who passed away nearly 13 years ago. It was a tattoo years in the making for both of us. As we settled in, John Mellencamp's "Jack and Diane" came on. Turns out Dakota and I both love this song (I have since I was a kid). It was the perfect soundtrack for the moment. The banter continued, the laughs were loud, and we left very happy customers.

Thank you, Nick, for the beautiful work, the great conversation, and the community you've built here. Petaluma is pretty darn lucky to have you.

📷: @Nik Cotten

♦️♦️♦️

This is an ongoing series from the team about local community members. If you have any recommendations of who we should meet, please message in the comments!

Walking into @Petaluma Tattoo before opening on a Thursday feels like stepping into the movie version of a tattoo shop. The kind you hope is real. Great music playing, artists trickling in one by one to set up their stations, the buzz of a room beginning for the day. @Nik Cotten, @Lauren Smith, and I got there just before the doors opened to sit down with @Nicolas Rodin, the owner. This is also the first time Porches has featured partners: @Sarah Rainey, Nick's partner, was spotlighted a while back, and getting to now feature Nick feels like a special community milestone for us. Nick has been tattooing for 27 years. He grew up in Torrance and Long Beach in a household that always celebrated the arts. His mom, who was a nurse, was also a painter. And at just the age of 14, his aunt put him to work hand-painting tile alongside her. Rodin said, "From an early age, it was, you should try and make art for a living. That was the whole thing." That message got reinforced in high school by an art teacher who believed in showing students that art could be a job, not just a hobby. He would bring former students back to talk about their working lives as artists. One of them was a tattoo artist, and Nick, who had already been doing acrylic paintings of tattooed arms in class, was hooked. "This is what I want to do." Around the same time, Nick went with his dad to get his first tattoo (a small mariner's cross for a life on the ocean) and was mesmerized. "It was dangerous and romantic and so cool." For his own tattoo, though, he waited until 18. His mom, the nurse, worried about garage tattoos that all his friends were getting and made him a deal. She would pay for his first tattoo if he waited until he was 18 and could get it done in a tattoo shop. He took the deal and designed his own coat of arms for it. He is still happy with how it looks. Nick's path into the industry was pure boots-on-the-ground. He was totally in love with the world of tattooing and after a short start to art college after high school, he quit, moved back in with his parents, and made himself indispensable to a tattoo shop owner in Harbor City. "I was on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He's like, 'Oh, I need my laundry done.' Pick my friend up at the airport at 2 in the morning. I would just go. Whatever he asked me to do, I did." Six months after that, he earned the trust of giving his first tattoo in the shop. "A nautical star, this big," he says, holding his hand to show the size of a half-dollar. "Took me three hours. My hand was shaking. I was so nervous. They're like, 'I don't think you can do this. I don't think it's going to work out.'" Laughs. He's still friends with the guy who got that tattoo, who sends him a photo of it once a year, confirming that it still looks good. From there, Nick spent about five years in LA, then made the move that shaped everything after. Blackheart Tattoo in San Francisco, one of the most respected shops in the country, hired him. "Blackheart's name was so big in the community that if you were, 'Nick Rodin from Blackheart Tattoo in San Francisco,' they'd say, 'Oh yeah, we'll get you in the convention. No problem.'" He rode that coattail for nearly a decade, met everyone worth meeting in the industry, and started collecting the connections that fill his guest chair now (including a recent visiting artist all the way from Austria). The move to Petaluma was supposed to be a compromise. He'd live here and commute to San Francisco or Oakland to tattoo. That plan lasted about as long as his art college career. "When I got here, I thought, oh wow, the community is very, very accessible. I really like every single person I've met since we moved here. And I want to tattoo these people. I don't want to go tattoo the people that I don't live next to." He worked at a shop in town for a few years, then opened Petaluma Tattoo. He and Sarah purchased the building and got the keys in February 2020. COVID hit weeks later. Nick says the delay turned into a gift. "That's why the shop looks the way it does. I had four months sitting here alone, the kids playing and me and Sarah hanging flash." The building itself is a beacon of Nick's design point of view. Purchasing a building for a tattoo shop is a bit unheard of, and he had a clear vision from the start for how the exterior should read. Hand-painted signs adorn the outside, and the paint colors themselves have become iconic. That whole visual language, bold, graphic, unmistakable, is a nod to the Milan-based Memphis Group of the 1980s and carries through to his tattoo work. What Nick has built in that space is what makes the Petaluma tattoo scene so distinctive. A high-caliber roster of artists ( @Greg Rojas has been at it 35 years and calls this his longest run at any shop; Jesse Haney, Dakota Williams, @Adrian Sanchez, and @Kahlil Rintye round it out) doing serious work in a room that hums with community. Nick brings in guest artists to keep the ideas moving. He cares about Petalumans, and it shows. He runs a big annual suicide prevention fundraiser, moving it from September to October this year, where the whole team tattoos all day and donates every dollar. "It's close to a lot of us. It makes us stand out." Local businesses donate the raffle prizes. Every year it grows. Nick's philosophy about what he tattoos comes down to something simple. "I love stuff that looks good as a tattoo." He'll turn away hateful work, and he's careful about talking people out of decisions driven by grief or fresh heartbreak. He's proudest of what he's built with the shop and won't say what's next except that something exciting is brewing around art in Petaluma, "unfortunately too early to share." When I asked what he looks forward to now that they're six years in, he said he'd love to travel with the team, do guest spots together, get inspired somewhere new and bring it back. For now, he's running a shop that other shops model themselves after and tattooing the people he lives next to. Lauren and I couldn't sit through an interview with a legendary tattoo artist without getting tattooed ourselves. Lauren got an arrow for her son, Arrow. I chose a small R, for my dad Robert, who passed away nearly 13 years ago. It was a tattoo years in the making for both of us. As we settled in, John Mellencamp's "Jack and Diane" came on. Turns out Dakota and I both love this song (I have since I was a kid). It was the perfect soundtrack for the moment. The banter continued, the laughs were loud, and we left very happy customers. Thank you, Nick, for the beautiful work, the great conversation, and the community you've built here. Petaluma is pretty darn lucky to have you. 📷: @Nik Cotten ♦️♦️♦️ This is an ongoing series from the team about local community members. If you have any recommendations of who we should meet, please message in the comments!