I love that whenever an odd piercing that works aesthetically is done, there are always a rapid-fire set of them that follow around the world. First we saw the ones from Massimo Cortese in Naples (who dubbed it the “Mantis”), and then not long afterward Pauly got them from Mateo Way (calling his “The Devil’s Threeway”), and now Luis Garcia has done a set, calling them simply “forward facing nostrils”. These are pictured here.

Brian Skellie reminded me that his wife Sandrine has had these piercings for over a decade (self-done), which I should have remembered when I met her back then here in Toronto (Caitlin is still mad at me because I let them smoke in my house but not her). Sandrine’s are the oldest that I can think of in the modern piercing scene. Each of these individuals wears the piercings slightly differently. Pauly and the Greek client fit them into a collection of very heavy facial work, Luis’s client balances them off of a pair of high nostrils, and Sandrine makes them work with the daintiest of beads — actually 1.5mm diamonds from NeoMetal. You wouldn’t think that such an odd piercing would be so aesthetically successful, but it is.

It should be noted that this piercing also has a solid pedigree in a number of indigenous societies.

To be clear, Samppa had nothing to do with that title, and in fact, I think actually officially calling this jewelry anything like that would be culturally insensitive. But it does remind me quite a lot of the look of many neo-tribal tattoos so the name sprung to mind instantly. In any case, this is a custom piece of nostril jewelry bent to shape by Samppa von Cyborg, currently on a world tour (the dates of which you can read at the bottom of his recent article on transdermal implant design) if you’re looking for work by him. It is held in place by pressure, with the inside of the jewelry being very much like a normal nostril screw. To be honest, anyone with some needle nosed pliers and some wire could have a lot of fun coming up with all sorts of related designs!

Here are a pair of wonderful black and white portraits of Will Powel taken by Daniel Milbourn of Meantime Photography (facebook.com/mean.times.1 and flickr.com/photos/meantimes/) in Inglewood, California. You can zoom in on the picture of Will’s hands with a click.

Edit: After initially posting this entry, I saw another wonderful modified person portrait by Daniel Milbourn that I wanted to feature as well. This is a picture of Dom Short who has quite an amazing and unique tattoo on his face. I should also add that limited edition framed and unframed prints are available, and you can contact Daniel directly if you’re interested in purchasing them — they would look amazing decorating tattoo and piercing studios (as well as homes and other businesses).

This will help you understand why doctors are notorious for messy handwriting. It’s because it’s not actually handwriting. It’s facewriting, or if we are to speak with the proper Latin term that doctors prefer, nostrilphiltrumlowbretwriting, which is difficult for even the most talented of calligrapher to do well.