A large turnout milled around, listened to live punk rock and chatted with the artists at a grand opening party for 3rd Street Tattoo on Pacific Coast Highway. The shop, run by Jeremy Hartland, Josh Kimbrell, Jeff Thielman, and Fletcher Dragge of Pennywise, has been open for business for about four weeks.
Playing the music bill for the party were Special C, Local Hate, Allura, All-Over, catering by Wee Man of “Jackass” and Chronic Taco fame, and giveaways by Electric Sunglasses, South Bay Skates and Misk Clothing.
Three tattoo parlors have opened in Hermosa, with another set to follow, after a federal appeals court struck down a citywide ban on the businesses. A citizens group is fighting the proliferation with a lawsuit.
The City Council recently rejected Planning Commission recommendations to ban body piercing and impose earlier closing times on the parlors, which have flocked to town following a court ruling that they cannot be kept out.
City officials say a total of seven could exist in town under the council’s tattoo-parlor ordinance, which came in the wake of a federal appeals court ruling that protects tattoo inking as a form of “pure speech” guaranteed by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The tattoo parlors have been named as defendants, along with the city, in a lawsuit by Citizens United aiming to overturn the ordinance that governs the parlors.
