When asked about her first tattoo, Sumina Shrestha laughs. “You can’t see it anymore, it’s covered up,” she says. Shrestha is one of just a few female tattoo artists in Nepal and runs her own studio in Thamel.

But the now 31-year-old started small. “It’s funny—before I ever knew I was going to become a tattoo artist, we actually hand-poked in our school,” she remembers. She and two of her friends bought sewing needles and fabric dyes at a local shop when they were around 15 years old, and hand-poked small symbols onto their wrists.

“I didn’t want to get in trouble alone, so I made my friends do it too,” Shrestha laughs. “We were very proud of our tattoos.” It did not occur to her for many years to become a tattoo artist, though.

Shrestha has always been a creative person. As a child, her dream was to become a painter. Although she does not come from an artistic family, her parents have always supported her ambitions. “Whenever I used to draw—even if it was crappy—they would be like: Wow, it’s so good! And that helped me a lot,” she recalls. “I’m fortunate for that. Many people don’t see art as a stable job.”

After finishing her degree in Fine Arts, she could not decide what to focus on. She still loved painting, but did not want to continue a career as a painter. She dabbled in cartoons, graphic design, and even fashion design. But nothing hit the mark.

Everything changed after the devastating earthquake of 2015. “I suddenly felt like we could die anytime,” Shrestha recalls. “So I wanted to start something. Something meaningful, that I wouldn’t get bored with.”

After the earthquake, she worked for an NGO running art-based healing projects for kids in areas devastated by the earthquake. During the project, she made new friends who were practising tattooing. She got her first real tattoo from these friends—and was intrigued.

Shrestha scraped together some money and bought materials to tattoo at home, where she practised on silicone skin, all learning by doing, without a teacher. “Back then, there were not many tutorials on YouTube,” she remembers. Instead, she called her friends whenever she had a question. “It was difficult to do it by myself, but I tried to figure it out somehow.”

The first people she tattooed were her sister and her aunt, who is the same age as her. “We were all hanging out together. It was one in the morning, I don’t know what got into her, but my aunt suddenly asked me to tattoo her,” Shrestha says. “I asked her if she was serious. She really wanted it.”

Before tattooing a person for the first time, she was very nervous. “But when I started, I felt delighted—and even happier that she trusted me.” After finishing the tattoo on her aunt, her sister was next. “After that, I couldn’t go back to silicone. I wanted real skin—it’s more interesting,” the tattoo artist says.

Before deciding to pursue tattooing as a career, she talked to her dad. “And he said: There are very few female tattoo artists. You should go for it,” she recalls. “So that’s how I started. And I never looked back.”

The start was not easy, though. It was financially challenging to afford the materials, while not having many clients yet. Being a woman in the scene made it even harder. There were very few women in this male-dominated field back then. “Being a female artist in Nepal was very, very difficult,” Shrestha says. People underestimated her. Clients did not want to get tattooed by her because of her gender.

“I had to fight against stereotypes and trust my abilities against everyone,” she says. “But every creation is proof that we as women can build our own space in this world with talent, courage, and determination.”

After some time, she got her first job in a tattoo studio through friends, where she improved her skills. It had always been her dream to open her own studio, but she was doubtful for a long time. She worked in different studios and went to India for a month to practice there. Finally, in 2019, she found the courage to open her own studio, Suminu Tattoo. Her studio started to get busy once she created a website to showcase her work online.

Today, she is often booked out well in advance, tattooing people from all over the world, locals and tourists alike. One of her favourite things about her profession is the encounters she has. “My clients are not just getting a tattoo. It’s more than that. We share stories, passions, and experiences. It’s about the connection.” There are people from abroad who have been coming back to her year after year to get a new tattoo.

Every client is different, she says, every skin feels different. Therefore, she is constantly learning and improving, even after over ten years in the business.

For her work, she recently won the Best Tattoo of the Day award at the International Nepal Tattoo Convention 2025, and she was given the Civil Art Appreciation Award from Civil Society for Transformation Nepal for her contributions to the industry over the years. “It means a lot because it shows my work is recognised, not just within the tattoo community but by society,” Shrestha says. “It’s a huge motivation for me.”

When she started tattooing, there was no official way to register a tattoo studio in Nepal. They had to be registered as beauty parlours. This has only changed in recent years. “There’s still a lot that needs to change in the mentality concerning tattoos and female tattoo artists,” Shrestha says.

This is one of the reasons she wants to stay in Nepal rather than work abroad, as many other tattoo artists do. “I want to continue working here and inspire more women.” She is now training women in her studio to be tattoo artists. “I always stress the importance of practice because tattooing is a big responsibility—it’s permanent, so you must always give your best.”