Today we’d like to introduce you to Russ Bagwell.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
We opened Royal Ave Tattoo on Valentine’s Day, 2013,which felt fitting, since the shop has always been a labor of love for us as partners in both marriage and business.
Russell’s path to Royal Ave started long before that. He’s been tattooing for over 22 years, cutting his teeth in Amarillo before making his way through San Marcos and Killeen, eventually landing at Locally Famous Tattoo. Along the way he found his true calling in Traditional, Neo Traditional, Japanese and Neo-Japanese bodysuit work, the kind of large-scale, years-long collaborative pieces that take real trust between artist and client. That specialty has since earned him international recognition, and today he tattoos clients that include UFC Flyweight Champion Joshua “Fearless” Van and Daniel “The Pit” Pineda.
My path ran alongside a different needle. I apprenticed as a piercer under Kieran Diedrich and have been piercing for 15 years now, including a piece published in BME back in 2012. When Russell and I decided to open our own shop, it made sense to build something that brought both of our crafts together under one roof.
Since then, I’ve run the business side: marketing, client relations, day-to-day operations, all of it, while continuing to pierce. Russell leads our tattoo work as head artist. Together we’ve grown Royal Ave into a shop with deep roots in the Spring, TX community, something that matters enormously to us, which is part of why we also serve on the board of The Metallic Sunflower Foundation and lead The Iron Petal Initiative, our community anchor program here.
It’s become a family affair in the truest sense,our son works our front counter, is apprenticing under me to become a piercer, and is also going through welding school on the side. Between all of it, Royal Ave is starting to carry into a second generation.
Thirteen years in, we’re still doing this together, still building something we’re proud of, one piece, one piercing, one client at a time.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
We’ve been through hard seasons too.
COVID slowed everything down and put a strain on the whole family, and Winter Storm Uri hit us hard financially right after. Then came the Tattoo apocalypse that shut steady shops down all over the country.
We lost one of our own artists, a close friend. And I lost my son. Both losses changed me. But I kept showing up, tattooing through it, training jiu-jitsu to get through it, one day at a time.
Through the good years and the brutal ones, we never stopped working the problem in front of us.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
What I’m most proud of isn’t any single piece, it’s the bodysuits. Watching a project evolve over years, seeing a client trust me with that much time and that much of their body, and finishing something that’s genuinely once-in-a-lifetime for both of us. That’s what sets this work apart from a lot of tattooing, it’s not a single session, it’s a relationship.
Alright, so to wrap up, is there anything else you’d like to share with us?
We’ve been featured in the Houston Press for my work, and I’ve taken home 20 + awards across tattoo conventions throughout Texas — recognition that means a lot, because those rooms are full of incredibly talented artists.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://Www.royalavetattoo.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/royalavetattoo
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/royalavetattoo
- Yelp: https://yelp.com/biz/royal-ave-tattoo-and-body-piercing-spring
