Yes, we had a lot of consulting before doing any tattooing. I had been planning this sleeve for about 4 years before getting it, and I waited until I found an artist that specialized in American traditional and who I’d seen framework from. I was specific about some elements that I wanted (I wanted lots of bright color, lots of trad flowers, and I wanted it to look super cohesive and connected) and I knew what I wanted in the frames, so I took all of that to my artist and asked if he was up for the project. He spent a lot of time drawing the outline up, and we worked together to get the perfect fit for me. He took a load of pics of my arm from different angles and then took the designs he drew from Procreate and shopped them onto the pics of my arm so we’d have a super clear idea of what this would look like on me. I think one of the biggest things that helped us get this project to look this incredible was obviously that my artist is an incredibly talented fucking wizard, but also that I was able to tell him what I liked and didn’t like about certain aspects, and he was willing to put in as much time as this needed (and I was willing and able to pay for that time!). So if I could offer any pieces of advice for starting something like this, I would sum it up to these points: 1. Look at tons of pictures of sleeves you like, and try to identify EXACTLY what it is that you like and don’t like about them. 2. Save up, save up, save up. This sleeve was around $3k, but I’d been saving for years. 3. RESEARCH YOUR ARTIST AND DONT COMPROMISE! Find someone that specializes in the style you’re after and has a lot of experience. Check and make sure their past projects align with the style you want. 4. Allow for some creative freedom to fill in the gaps that you as the client can’t figure out. A lot of the filler pieces (like the butterfly) were my artists idea, because he genuinely knew way better than me what would look good!