Cre­ative Women in Busi­ness: Dream­land

Cre­ative Women in Busi­ness is a se­ries of ar­ti­cles that fo­cuses on women-owned busi­nesses in the cre­ative spaces of St. Louis. The main pur­pose of my se­ries is to high­light women, and to give them recog­ni­tion for their art in the com­mu­nity. This first busi­ness is a tat­too shop called Dream­land.

Photo cour­tesy of Is­abelle Roig

Dream­land is by far the cutest pri­vate tat­too stu­dio in St. Louis. Founder and owner, Gogo­marz, has re­opened the busi­ness af­ter re­mod­el­ing in Jan­u­ary. This stu­dio is women-owned and women-op­er­ated, and is by ap­point­ment only for 18+. If you love anime, Hello Kitty, or any­thing adorable, this stu­dio is the place to go for your next tat­too!

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw

Con­sid­er­ing that it is still a male dom­i­nated in­dus­try, I want to high­light this busi­ness and the high qual­ity ser­vice and care they of­fer as tat­too artists. It’s im­por­tant to sup­port lo­cal busi­nesses and cre­ators as well. The top pri­or­i­ties of Dream­land is for every­one to feel com­fort­able and wel­comed, in­clud­ing Maryville stu­dents. 

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

My first in­ter­vie­wee is the founder and owner Maria, known as Gogo­marz. She has been do­ing tat­toos pro­fes­sion­ally for 4 years, and has over 6 years of ex­pe­ri­ence. She is on In­sta­gram @gogo­marz, where you can find out if her book­ings are open or closed, and the fol­low­ing is the link to her web­site: www.gogo­marz.com. Gogo is cur­rently book­ing for her Valen­tine’s Day flash! She will also be guest spot­ting at Joy Stu­dio in LA dur­ing the end of March, from the 21-24th. 

Photo cour­tesy of Gogo­marz

The col­lage above show­cases a mix of her work. Gogo’s style fo­cuses on fine-line and mi­cro/​color re­al­ism. She is very de­tailed in all of her tat­toos!

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

“I’ve al­ways been in­ter­ested in art whether it was col­or­ing, paint­ing, or work­ing with my hands. My work is heav­ily in­spired by anime, es­pe­cially manga books that fit the fine line and shad­ing style I use in my tat­toos. I’m close with a lot of cre­ative peo­ple and my friends in­spire me con­stantly. All these re­la­tion­ships are spe­cial to me. I’ve built so many strong con­nec­tions with peo­ple through tat­too­ing, some­thing I would not have if I were in any other pro­fes­sion…” (cont.)

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

“…I did­n’t know how tat­too­ing and mak­ing it fi­nan­cially would work, but I wanted to try. Be­ing able to sus­tain my­self do­ing my job feels su­per re­ward­ing. See­ing my art on my clients and friends is a great feel­ing as well. Through my work I’ve shown my fam­ily that
go­ing the tra­di­tional route is­n’t al­ways the best for every­one. They’re able to see that you can fol­low your cre­ative dreams and sup­port your­self.” ~ Gogo­marz

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw

The other res­i­dent artist at Dream­land is Rea­gan, known as Jinx­poke. She spe­cial­izes in hand-poked tat­toos/​stick-and-pokes. She started her ap­pren­tice­ship un­der Gogo­marz in March 2023, and got her li­cense in No­vem­ber 2023. Her In­sta­gram is @jinx­poke, and the fol­low­ing is the link to her web­site: www.jinx­poke.com. 

Photo cour­tesy of Jinx­poke

The col­lage above show­cases some of Jinx­poke’s work. Her style fo­cuses on pointil­lism for light dot work that looks soft and dreamy.

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

“I started tat­too­ing my­self and my friends, and then took it more se­ri­ously over this past year. I loved draw­ing in pointil­lism on pa­per when I was very young, and it trans­lates to the style of tat­toos I do to­day. I’m re­ally in­spired by na­ture, plants, and an­i­mals. Gogo­marz also in­spires me, she has taught me so much. Cute and creepy de­signs are what I en­joy tat­too­ing the most…” (cont.)

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

“…Stick-and-pokes are niche and haven’t be­come su­per com­mon in the tat­too in­dus­try. Hand pok­ing is a very in­ten­tional process, it takes longer to com­plete than a tat­too gun would. It’s fo­cused more on dots than lines, which re­sults in a grainy look. The most re­ward­ing part of my job is see­ing peo­ple leave my booth feel­ing more con­fi­dent in their bod­ies. And fun fact the name Jinx­poke is in­spired by my cat Jinx, who just cel­e­brated her 5th birth­day.” ~ Jinx­poke

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

To book an ap­point­ment, di­rectly con­tact the artists and fill out the book­ing forms on their web­sites. Dream­land is lo­cated on 3325 Chero­kee St. with free street park­ing for clients. You can bring one friend to ac­com­pany you as well. The wait­ing area has snacks, col­or­ing books, manga, and other ac­tiv­i­ties avail­able for use un­til it’s time for your tat­too ses­sion.

Photo cour­tesy of Liz San­ti­maw 

These women are ex­tremely tal­ented, pro­fes­sional, pas­sion­ate, and artis­tic! Their work is unique and truly one of a kind. Gogo­marz is very sweet and ac­com­mo­dat­ing, and is an in­spi­ra­tion to the com­mu­nity. Jinx­poke of­fers a spe­cial tech­nique with an in­ten­tional hand. Many clients have en­joyed their ex­pe­ri­ence at Dream­land, and you can too! Don’t for­get to grab some com­pli­men­tary can­dies be­fore you leave. <3