Radchad's Ancient Art Tattoo Blacksburg

Established tattoo business with a prime Downtown Blacksburg location right in the Center of all activity, on picturesque Roanoke Street. Operating for at least the last two Decades, I’ve never ventured by this shop that they weren’t busy.
There’s almost always a full Lobby on most weekend nights, and I think you could say that this is the first choice of tattoo artists for the Virginia Tech community.
As long as I’ve been in town, I’ve never heard anything negative about this shop. All contacts must go through my Attorney.

I have been tattooed by Cory with no issue. He's friendly, and done an excellent job. I do however find that their scheduling is atrocious. I have eleven tattoos, from 4 different shops and 6 different artists, but no where is as difficult at Ancient Art. Their front desk clerk is rude, unhelpful and tries to give you time and cost estimates although he has no idea what he's talking about. He tries to act like an artist, but everywhere else I'd go you deal with the actual artist on these things. Honestly, I like Cory, but there's a ton of great artists and shops in Roanoke that have a more helpful staff and more variety in styles. If you're putting something permanent on your body it's worth dealing with a better atmosphere.

Great service, quick and easy tattoo, not very painful

The guy at the desk was rude. We called before hand to see if we can get a walk-in and he told us to come to the store to look at them (fair enough). When we got to the store he was even more rude and he treated us like we were disturbing his work and talked to us with short words and overall made us feel stupid and unwelcome. Absolutely horrible.

The place itself and the people are nice and the price is reasonable, but apparently it's just too much to ask a tattoo artist to do some straight, parallel lines. The stencil looked different from what actually came out of my arm, and the glaring imperfections were clear once the tattoo healed. Uneven, shaky, fading, blown out line work make a bad tattoo even worse. I'm getting it covered up by real artists, not just ones who specialize in cheap Pinterest tattoos in a college town.

Wonderful experience for my first tattoo. My tattoo was done by Alan in a timely manner and looks awesome. It is a portrait of a lion and looks super realistic. I highly recommend.

The jewelry was insanely over priced. The receptionist was INSANELY rude and seemed to struggle with the basic phone conversation she was having while I waited? I unfortunately didn’t have any more masks as we had been hiking and been around all day. I peaked my head in the door to let the woman at the front know what I needed so I didn’t go in all the way without a mask (AS SHE WAS WAVING FOR ME TO GET AWAY FROM THE DOOR) so she gave me one while mumbling to herself “let’s follow state regulations guys”. I had used all of mine (gloves as well) and lost my belly button ring in the woods by that time.

Also, masks are optional. So even if I was someone who chose not to participate in that, there was no sign stating it was necessary.

I got my first and second tattoo at this shop and the quality is excellent. I got my first tattoo in 1998 and second in 2006. I have had other tattoo artists say that the quality is awesome. I recommend this shop they only hire the best artists. Excellent work.

Got my tragus pierced here and they said they had the "high end jewelry" but I didn't even have the piercing in a week and the balls that screw on to the post fell off. Went back had the post reput in and both the balls feel off within a day. I'm better off putting my own jewelry in. Nice people but really bad jewelry that's not worthwhile.

My septum was done completly WRONG!!!!I went in March 20th, 2021 to have my septum pierced. It was HORRILE!! The most PAINFUL piercing I've ever gotten, it was only so incredibly painful because it was pierced in the wrong spot! Instead of being pierced threw the "sweet spot" I was pierced threw my cartilage!! Not only was it EXTREMELY painful, my nose POURED blood so much that I was given napkins to hold under my chin to avoid dripping blood everywhere.. I thought the worst was over! I was sadly mistaken.. later in the day I tried to eat but could not eat due to the jewelry being so far down it would hit/scrape on my food which would again, cause extreme pain.. just a week later I had noticed that it was uneven.. it was still VERY tender to touch I looked and it had started coming OUT OF THE BOTTOM OF MY NOSE!!!!!! The staff them selfs are super awesome & sweet & definitely make you feel safe & at home!
(My piercing was cleaned as directed & I cleaned it with the pre-made Q-Tips they sell in their shop)
1st picture: after returning to my car from shop.
2nd picture: Showing how low it had fallen to bottom of my nose.