Lyle Tuttle in front of his shop in San Francisco.
Front of the tattoo shop at 841 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco.
The interior of one wall with designs and tattoo artifacts from around the world.
By going public in the late 1960s as Janis Joplin’s artist, Lyle Tuttle helped make it acceptable for tattooed women to be powerful role models today.
“Because I was lucky to have the greatest time slot that any tattoo artist ever had in tattooing, it wound up that I had tattooed on six continents. So I had an opportunity to tattoo on seven continents.” -Lyle Tuttle
Jim Moore, Lyle Tuttle and Deborah Monlux in front of the shop.
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I hadn’t seen Lyle Tuttle since 1972 which was when I was last in San Francisco. I did an article on him for the rock & roll magazine CRAWDADDY with photographs and an interview. The story never got published by the photograph is posted on this blog.
Last month I had a chance to revisit San Francisco and wanted to see if I could contact Lyle and meet up. He was very receptive and we met and had drinks, dinner and talked throughout the night. Here are a few photographs.
Me and Lyle Tuttle hanging out at the local bar near his shop.
Lyle, Deborah and Gina Braden talking whiskey with the bartender. (he wasn’t as mean as he looks!)
Lyle shows Deborah some photographs on his phone.
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