EXCLUSIVE: OK! speaks to tattoo artist Kevin Paul about his experiencing tattooing Harry Styles and what happened when Ed Sheeran gave the Daylight singer some body art

Over recent years, Harry Styles’ tattoo collection has garnered quite a lot of attention. With his body art reportedly made up of around 60 pieces, fans have long speculated what each design could mean.

Having inked several of Harry’s designs during his time in One Direction, celebrity tattoo artist Kevin Paul speaks to OK! about how the 29 year old singer’s initial choice of tatts was a “last minute” decision after being introduced by a fellow musician.

“I met Harry through Ed Sheeran,” Kevin explained. “I used to work with Ed quite a lot and he said that his friend Harry wanted to get some tattoos done at the same time in London. I didn’t know he meant Harry Styles!”

Tattoo artist Kevin Paul has opened up about how he met Harry Styles through Ed Sheeran (Image: David M. Benett/Getty Images for Fudge Urban)

During the trip to London, Kevin met Harry and called him a “lovely lad”, though revealed that the As It Was singer’s choice of body art was a relatively last minute decision.

“So I went down to a flat in Holloway to see them both. Harry was a lovely lad – he was probably a year or two years into One Direction when I worked with him, so he was famous worldwide, but he kept changing his mind with what he was going to do. It was all last minute,” he said.

Throughout his career, Kevin, who has tattooed a wide range of famous faces, gave Harry a handful of designs including the star’s ‘17 black’ tattoo on his collarbone.

Kevin tattooed Ed and Harry during a trip to London (Image: Kevin Mazur/Fox/WireImage)

“That’s because he lost some money in Australia when he gambled on 17 black,” Kevin explained. “So he thought, ‘I’ll have that’, as a sign to not do it again.”

He also gave Harry and Ed a matching design relating to the cartoon Pingu. “He and Ed Sheeran were out the night before and they were going on about loving Pingu the penguin. It was their favourite cartoon as kids, so they both had it done,” the tattoo artist added.

During the same session, Harry even received a special tattoo from the Shape Of You singer. “I’d already trained Ed to tattoo by this point and they came up with the idea of Ed tattooing Harry, so he tattooed a little lock on his wrist,” Kevin recalled. “But when it came out in the papers, everybody said it looked like a handbag.”

Ed gave Harry a tattoo of a padlock, and the pair have matching Pingu tattoos (Image: Instagram / Kevin Paul Tattoo)

All in all, Kevin states that the Sign Of The Time performer has some “strong” pieces in his collection, explaining that he’s seen some people seek to replicate some of his designs.

“The tattoo of the butterfly on his stomach is one of his nicest pieces, I think,” he said. “I’ve seen a lot of people copy it, including celebrities.”