A new shop has moved into Magazine Street, and it’s already being packed with Tulane students. STUDS, a piercing shop, opened just a few weeks ago, right across from 90s Kid’s Closet and diagonal to Whole Foods. STUDS only has a few locations across the country, most in big cities like New York and Los Angeles, so it was just a matter of time before they opened up a shop in New Orleans.
STUDS was created for the ear scape, the latest jewelry trend that has been absolutely exploding on social media for the past few years, and the craze seems nowhere near stopping. STUDS calls earscaping “the art and science of ear piercing and ear stacking for your unique ear anatomy style.” They offer a massive photo album of inspiration on their website, with beautifully scaped ears showing off their adorable collection of earrings. They design their jewelry to work with needle piercing, which is the safest way to pierce your ears and gives you the best healing time and precise piercings.
Last week I went with three friends to check it out. The STUDS shop is small but modern, with all-white walls and countertops, iPads as cash registers, and life-sized earrings as seats. They have a fantastic display of earrings you can buy, cutely arranged on glass frames or displayed on oversized yellow ears. The prices of their pieces are some of the best I’ve ever seen in legitimate earring shops (legitimate as in, safe for all piercings and will not tarnish). The earrings are insanely adorable and creative. My favorite is the gold studs that spell out “Y’all and Huggies” with cowboy hats and boots dangling off them.
The thing I love the most about STUDS is their diverse earring selection for what they can pierce you with. Most shops have a limited selection, sometimes just silver balls or ridiculously expensive diamonds; however, STUDS offers a vast range of possible earrings. Although their more creative and gold studs are on the pricier side, from $80-100, they still have a great selection of super cute silver and sparkly studs starting at $30- which is impressive for a piercing shop. In addition, for them to pierce your ears costs only $35 (also fantastic – especially in New Orleans), so you can get a piercing done with an adorable set of new earrings for only $65. For a price reference, a widely known piercing shop on Frenchman Street, with a much smaller selection of pricey jewelry, charged me $250 for two piercings, so STUDS opening up in NOLA is a game changer for those pursuing the earscape.
I always try to go in with an open mind every time I get a piercing and ask what they think is best, and I’ve never felt safer doing that than at STUDS. My piercer has been working in New Orleans for 12 years and has a dazzling array of piercings on his own ear to show for it, which always makes me more comfortable letting him pick where my next will be. We decided on the tragus (which apparently helps with headaches and vertigo)! He was definitely a pro. He handed me a matching pink stress ball and hair clip and talked about his favorite restaurants to distract me from my bubbling fear. Within five minutes, I was up and out of the room with a new piercing in my ear that barely hurt at all. My other friends went before I did; one got her first cartilage and a third lobe piercing, and the other added a cute 4th stack to her triples. We all walked out of STUDS ecstatic with how they looked and how little they hurt.
Featured image via Studs.com.
