Even though Williamsburg is being transformed into a polished landscape of luxury developments with high rents, the neighborhood’s tattoo parlors remain open in the moneyed area and report that business is strong, according to a piece in the Wall Street Journal. After all, ink has a certain caché among hip neighborhood residents, and artists can charge as much as $350 an hour for their services.
“It’s one of the businesses that thrives,” Gene Coffey, a tattoo artist at Tattoo Culture on Roebling Street, told the Journal. “Bars, tattoo shops and prostitution pretty much don’t take a dip during a recession.”
Ten years ago, retail rents off the Bedford Avenue strip went for less than $15 per square foot, according to Timothy King of CPEX Real Estate Services. Now, the area sees retail rents go for $120 to $160 per square foot, which the Journal said is still bargain-priced when compared to Manhattan. [WSJ] — Zachary Kussin