ELSWR looks to be your go-to shop for tattoos, fine art and socializing

Tim Harty, The Business Times

Walk in the front door, look to your left, and a wall of paintings done by Garrett Mallekoote will literally stare back at you. Most of his work on display has faces and eyes, such as as the clown face resembling Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker.

Or look to your right and take note of the lounge area where a couch, loveseat and chair encircle a coffee table with a nice, large chess set centered on it, beckoning you to embrace your inner Gary Kasparov or Magnus Carlsen (two of the greatest to ever play game).

Then, look straight ahead into the heart of the long, open, rectangular, commercial space and gaze upon the work stations of the half-dozen tattoo artists who now reside at ELSWR (that’s short for Elsewhere) Tattoo Studio, 518 Colorado Ave. in downtown Grand Junction.

Initial impressions serve as a good representation of what co-owners Brandon Fuller and Jake Sheffield want to impart to customers.

• Of course, ELSWR is first and foremost a tattoo studio, which Fuller and Sheffield decided to open when they realized Elysium, the downtown Grand Junction tattoo studio where Sheffield had operated for the past eight or nine years, and Fuller for seven years, would be closing its doors.
• It also makes sense that tattoo artists apply their creativity elsewhere, such as painting and sculpture, like what Paul Lunetta was doing on May 13 when, sans tattoo customer, he had time to work on a water-based clay figure. His goal is to make a resin cast of the sculpture and have the ability to make three-dimensional prints.
• And for its customers or tattoo aficionados who just want to hang out, they can do that at ELSWR.

Getting their own tattoo studio was a combination of Fuller and Sheffield being ready to do it and the imminent end of Elysium, which was housed in an old church, 535 N. Seventh St., that Elysium owners Arlo DiCristina and Ryan Ashley renovated, but now they are trying to sell it.

A few other Elysium alumni are joining Sheffield and Fuller at ELSWR, and they said that was an important piece allowing them to become business owners.

“The cohesiveness, the team that you’re working with in a tattoo shop, is one of the highest levels of importance,” Fuller said. “So we came over with people who have also spent seven, eight years at Elysium or more. And knowing that we’ve got that made all the difference, gave us confidence to move into a shop knowing we have a really good, talented, high-caliber crew of tattoo artists.

“And Jake being one of them and myself, this is just going to evolve, right? So we’re gonna have a lot of really talented people coming in, and we’re hoping to keep it that high caliber.”

Sheffield and Fuller opened the studio near the end of April before any art adorned the walls. Two weeks later, it was looking a lot more like the space they envisioned when they decided they wanted to open their own tattoo studio.

There’s more to do, though, as Sheffield said ELSWR likely will have a three to six-month window before having its grand opening.

“We’re just trying to see how long it’s gonna take to really get everything exactly how we want it before we unveil everything,” he said.

In addition to the resident tattoo artists, ELSWR will have room for guest artists, and they said DiCristina definitely wants to do some tattooing there.

Ashley also is invited to tattoo at ELSWR, and Fuller said, “She told us she’s going to let us know, because her travel schedule is pretty intense right now, but we hope to see her around as well.”

Sheffield said the tattoo artists at ELSWR know people who tattoo all around the country, “and a lot of tattoo artists are nomadic kind of people, so we’ll have a lot of guests coming through from all over the U.S.”

Sheffield said ELSWR will be a fun place.

“We’ve worked together so long, so when people come in here, it’s not gonna be a bland time,”

he said. “We have a lot of fun when we’re tattooing, since we all know each other so well.”

When it comes to the styles of the tattoo artists at ELSWR, Fuller described them as being “more into the fine-art world.”

“A lot of these tattoo shops are what you might consider traditional, American traditional … I think this shop in particular is more loaded with people that do realism and surrealism,” he said. “So, it’s a different genre of tattoo, sort of a cohesive-like genre of people who do more of the kind of realistic – there’s several subdivisions of that – but it’s not like an American traditional shop. It’s not just a walk-in shop. 

“You can come here and get a really big custom – we tattoo people for multiple days at a time, and you get a nice custom piece from us. It’s a little different, but we’re also engaging in being part of a street shop, because we want to be more involved in the public.”

Fuller added if he was promoting the business, he would just let people know that ELSWR is a custom tattoo shop that wants to remain a high-caliber one where customers have a great experience.

“Everybody hears ‘customer-service-oriented’ and ‘talented artists,’” he said. “We have been putting a lot of effort in this place, because we want to continue that, you know?”

Sheffield echoed the custom-tattoo sentiment and said, “I think everybody here will give that person a completely custom tattoo, something that other people don’t have, and take their time working with the idea and the design and not just getting them in and out. It’s not like a revolving door. It’s more like: We want you to have something special.”

The owners know what they’re doing

ELSWR tattoo studio co-owners Jake Sheffield and Brandon Fuller paid their tattoo dues en route to opening their own studio.

Sheffield said he’s been tattooing for about 15 years. He said he got his start in Florida when he was about 17 years old, then tattooed in Michigan for “about four or five years, and he’s been in Grand Junction almost 10 years.

Fuller said he was born and raised in Southern California and had an interest in tattooing since he was young, admitting, “I would secretly give my friends tattoos here and there.”

He said he was in his mid-30s when he decided to finish up his art degree and get a tattoo apprenticeship. He said he worked at a shop in Laguna Beach, Calif., for a while and went to a large tattoo convention, where he met his current girlfriend, who so happened to be shop manager at Elysium Tattoo Studio in Grand Junction. He said he ended up in Grand Junction as a result, started tattooing at Elysium in 2019, and remained there until starting ELSWR with Sheffield.

Found their way to Colorado Avenue

Sheffield said he and Fuller kicked around the idea of opening their own tattoo studio for a couple years, “just to have our own space, our own place, just to do things how we saw fit, you know?”

He said they considered buying a house for the business, “but it just kind of didn’t seem right.”

Then, they learned about the available unit at 518 Colorado Ave., which previously was home to antique store High Desert Authentiques.

“We stumbled upon this place, and the landlord was willing to work with us,” Sheffield said. “She did a lot of upgrades and everything, and it just kind of made sense.”

The long, open rectangle that is the unit’s interior was perfect for what Fuller and Sheffield envisioned.

“That was one of the biggest things is finding the right layout,” Sheffield said. “Looking into some of the houses, they just aren’t set up for this kind of business. But finding this, there’s a giant rectangle. (The space between) each pillar is basically the perfect amount of room for a booth. There was already electrical around each one of those pillars, so it just seemed kind of like the perfect fit for a tattoo shop, oddly enough, because it never was anything like that.”

Fuller and Sheffield also liked the location on Colorado Avenue, as Sheffield called it “awesome” and added, “We had heard that there’s a lot of cool stuff happening on the street. There’s a lot of new restaurants; they got the dispensary over here; Moody’s (Underground) is opening up. … It just seemed like a really good fit for a tattoo shop.”

Into the Finer Arts

ELSWR wants to be more than just a tattoo shop, and the resident tattoo artists’ love of fine art will be evident and highlighted.

“A few of us do 3D modeling and stuff like that, so people will be able to come in and possibly buy little statues, original paintings,” Sheffield said. “I don’t think there’s a lot of tattoo shops around here that also have a gallery. So, we’ll have a gallery up and running with some of that stuff, fine art, oil paintings.

“We’re gonna try to do a lot of stuff that’s a little different.”

The Social Club

Part of doing stuff “that’s a little different” is the ELSWR artists’ penchant for socializing.

“We’re trying to make it comfortable in the sense that this is a place that you just want to come hang out,” Fuller said. “Because we have a pretty deep clientele base, and we love seeing it. And now they can stop by more frequently and just say hello, hang out, maybe probably get their next tattoo.

“So, we just want to be welcoming and the best experience for somebody looking for a custom tattoo or a smaller tattoo. Just try to keep it a high-level place.”

Sheffield added, “We want to also be a little bit like a social club. You don’t have to come in just for a tattoo. You can just come in and hang out.”

Willing to share their expertise

Sheffield and Fuller said they eventually want to offer seminars from time to time, as they’ve experienced their value first-hand.

“It doesn’t even have to be necessarily for tattooers,” Fuller said, “because a lot of us paint. There might be seminars where, say, you were into painting, you could come and hang out with us for a night, do a painting.

“We also have a lot of resources in that world, because of what we do that kind of overlap. … It’s down the road for us, but we want to be able to provide more accessibility to our work as well.”