As Pete Davidson’s suddenly ink-less arms show, tattoos are no longer forever

Tattoos are no longer forever. 

Pete Davidson emerged from rehab last week looking like a clean slate.

“The King of Staten Island” star, 30, wore a short-sleeve t-shirt to a Los Angeles Clippers game with rapper buddy Machine Gun Kelly and the tattoos that once covered the comedian’s forearms appeared significantly faded and in some cases non-existent.

Davidson first started having his tattoos removed years ago, and the process has gotten increasingly popular.

A slew of stars — including Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie and Jessica Alba — have erased ink in recent years, and business is booming for tattoo removal companies.

“We just had our best month,” Lorenzo Kunze, owner of Inkless Tattoo Removal in Soho, told The Post.

Davidson started having his tattoos removed years ago so he doesn’t have to spend “three hours” to get them covered up on film sets, he told “Late Night” host Seth Meyers in 2021. Rosalind O'Connor/NBC via Getty Images

He has worked with athletes from the New York Giants and Rangers and comics including Michael Rapaport. But the majority of his clients aren’t rich or famous: They’re typical millennials.

“Our biggest demographic are women and men between the ages of 25 and 35,” Kunze said. He noted that people tend to get tired of their tattoos — especially those gotten in spontaneous moments in their teens and early 20s — after about three years and that they are often motivated by professional ambitions.

In 2021 on “Late Night” with Seth Meyers, Davidson explained that he was compelled to removes his body art so that he didn’t have to spend “three hours” to get them covered up on film sets. 

“I honestly never thought that I would get an opportunity to act and I love it a lot,” he told Meyers.

“Burning them off is worse than getting them,” Davidson told Meyers in 2021 about the tattoo removal process.

But, he admitted that the process was neither easy nor painless.

“Burning them off is worse than getting them, because not only are they burning off your skin, but you’re wearing these big goggles, right? So you can’t see anything, and the doctor’s in there with you,” Davidson said.

Laser tattoo removal is the most common removal method. A laser is used on the skin to break up the tattoo ink into small particles that the body’s immune system dissolves over time. Sessions typically last 30 minutes and cost several hundred dollars; multiple sessions are usually required.

Davidson got three tattoos for Kim Kardashian when the pair dated between October, 2021 and August, 2022  – “My girl’s a lawyer” on his neck; the words “Jasmine and Aladdin” from their first kiss in the Aladdin-themed SNL skit; and KNSCP, a reference to her kids, North, Saint, Chicago and Psalm.”  One of Davidson’s tattoos for Kim Kardashian reads: “My girl is a lawyer.”

Michelle Myles, an artist at Daredevil Tattoo in the Lower East Side, so-called “sleeves” — heavily inked forearms like Davidson had — can require up to a dozen treatments for removal.

The SNL alum wore his heart out as art on his sleeve — literally. Over the years, he amassed a slew of tattoos related to romantic relationships that went bust.

While dating Cazzie David, he had a self-portrait she’d drawn of herself as a child inked on the inside of his arm.

They split in 2018, and months later he got engaged to Ariana Grande and had her initials inscribed on his thumb.

Davidson also got Kardashian’s name branded on his neck.

The engagement didn’t last and Davidson went on to date Kim Kardashian for nearly a year — and three tattoos related to her, including one that emblazoned “My girl’s a lawyer” on his neck — before they split in August 2022.

“These kinds of tattoos he had seem really impulsive,” Myles said. “I’m not surprised looking at everything that he got [some] removed.”

Aside from ink for his exes, Davidson has amassed dozens of other dubious tattoos over the years, from portraits of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Hillary Clinton to a giant red mouth shark on his chest and the Verrazano Bridge below his collar bone.

Some, Myles told the Post, look more intricate than others. 

Before Davidson and Ariana Grande broke off their engagement in October 2018, after five months, the SNL alum had her initials inked on his thumb. Apart from ink from his exes, Davidson has amassed dozens of other tattoos over the years, including a giant shark on his chest, seen here, and a portrait of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on his left shoulder. “For a laser, you have to wait for it to heel which could be up to six weeks. It takes a lot longer to remove something than to try to go all over it but not all cover ups will work as a cover,” an expert said of the time consuming tattoo removal process. Davidson likely had multiple laser sessions to remove his more elaborate tattoos.

“There’s one he had of an elaborate tree in a forest that goes all the way around his forearm. That might have been six to 10 hours [to remove], then you have some that look pretty spur-of-the-moment – they’re called ignorant style tattoos,” Myles said.

Mike Bellamy, owner of Red Rocket Tattoo in Midtown told The Post, that tattoo removals and cover ups — in which he will recreate a new design over an old one — have been on the rise, in part, because impulsive tattoos are on the rise.

“You can now find people doing ink at bars and even weddings. Younger people are impulsive. They’ll come in and say, ‘I’m not even sure what I want’ and they’ll pick something,” Bellamy said.

Angelina Jolie famously had a tattoo of Billy Bob Thornton removed from her arm after splitting with the actor in 2002.  Johnny Depp infamously changed his tattoo “Winona Forever” to “Wino Forever” after he split from actress Winona Ryder in 1993.  In 2008, Pharrell Williams had a skin graft, a surgical procedure involving transplanting healthy skin from one part of the body to another, plus an additional laser treatment to remove his arm tattoos, including one of a guardian angel he felt he outgrew.

“Names have always been the biggest tattoo to get removed, covered up or regretted — it’s always the question of, ‘Are you sure about this before you do it?”

Myles says Davidson almost certainly used laser removal, which has gotten faster and more effective in recent years.

Years ago, the process wasn’t so simple.

Jessica Alba removed a tattoo from her neck that she’d gotten at age 17. “I’m so irritated that I got it lasered many times, and it’s not coming out,” Alba told Refinery 29 in 2019 of getting her neck tattoo lasered off.

In 2008, Pharrell Williams had to have a skin graft — a surgical procedure involving transplanting healthy skin from one part of the body to another — plus laser treatments to remove his arm tattoos, including one of a guardian angel he felt he outgrew. 

“It’s going to be pricey, but worth it.” Williams told British Vogue at the time. “I got fire on my arms! I’m a grown man!”