Outside, the shop front is shabby and dull. I walk around the corner and look at the painted wood door, the red paint peeling with age. I push at it slowly and enter a corridor, a wall of must and heat greeting me. Slowly, I climb the steps, one at a time, trepidation twisting at my stomach muscles. At the top of the stairs is a relatively new, and comparatively well cared for door. I push through it, and enter a colorful world.



Maybe it is the colorful walls. Or perhaps it is the rails of sketches that are enticing you to look through but simply being that makes you feel part of it. So you flick through, the guy at the counter who looks like a human advertisement for tattoos ignoring you coolly as you look.

Flicking through the pages you find many different butterflies, backed with a scene of fairies seated atop of flowers, roses, surrounded by them. And my lips curve into a smile. Perhaps two of the most popular designs for females today are the butterfly and the fairy. They show a particularly feminine side to nature and mythology, and are often seen to be beautiful, carefree and gentle.

To all, butterflies are a vibrant symbol of transformation. They are the complete and utter depiction of a fragile world where change is extremely common, in fact, when change is just the cycle of life. And this symbolism has not been lost on you either. Drawn to it, you know you want something like that.

Not completely sure you glance through again. Flip. Flip. And there, another butterfly, but this time, it is settled upon the outstretched hand of a fairy. You wonder how she can do that, butterflies die when they come into contact with a human hand. But a fairy is not human, and again, with your lips turning at the edges, you see how magical she is.

The combination of the butterfly and fairy could be simply because you think it is beautiful, but if you are like me, it may symbolize the fragility of childhood. Or, for others, the transformation from one thing, child hood innocence, into another, maybe explained by the womanly appearance of the fairy themselves.