PERMANENT tattoos tend to lose their lustre within five years if you’re a woman, claims a study which reports that fickle females are more than twice as likely as men to have their tatts taken off.

The survey of 196 people who visited clinics seeking to have their body art erased, shows that getting “irrevocable” markings is often bitterly regretted.

Though it may be a bit late for the massively inked likes of Amy Winehouse, the report in the Archives of Dermatology says that tattooed women often feel their identities have shifted and they want to dissociate themselves from their pasts.

The researcher, Myrna Armstrong, of Texas Tech University, says women get tattoos to feel unique and independent. Tatts are also at the peak of hipness: this month’s Vogue has a spread dedicated to celebrating inked-up women celebs.

But if something’s in Vogue, it’s bound to lose its vogueness rapidly, as the survey shows. While the women were pleased with their tattoos when they got them, they reported that their feelings began to change after about a year.

The study found that most of the painted ladies were single, college-educated and from stable families. Within five years, the tatts began to cause them embarrassment, as well as wardrobe and career trouble. The tattoos also no longer satisfied their need to express uniqueness. Some of the women wanted them off because they were getting married — or divorced.

About a fifth of tattoo wearers are dissatisfied with their tattoo, Armstrong says, though only 6 per cent are currently moved to get them scrubbed out.

The most popular method of removal involves firing a laser quickly at the skin to shatter the pigment so that the body breaks it down. But there are risks, including incomplete removal of the tattoo, or scarring.

Many practitioners are trained in laser removal, but there is an art to it that comes only with experience, so it’s best to find someone who’s had plenty of practice.

Dissatisfied girls could also try copying the rapper Pharrell Williams. After covering most of his body

in tatts he wants a change. So he’s planning to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds at a North Carolina clinic that grows new skin

in the lab, which will be stitched over his old tattoos. After that, Williams wants to have a whole new set done.

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