“I always felt like I wanted to make a space where people like me could feel welcome, where you don’t exactly fit into the high-end luxury, but you also don’t want the dingy experience.”
After 11 years threading through New York’s piercing industry — from an early stint at a small West Village shop to luxury names including Maria Tash and Wildlike — Stephanie Mariano has brought her own vision on luxury piercing to life with Tau Studio, distilling years of her technical rigor, continual education and client care into a private studio that feels as intentional as the jewelry it houses.
Here there is no bustling retail floor. Rather, Tau is organized around one client at a time, allowing each visit to unfold at its own pace, moving between consultation, styling, anatomy, after care and conversation. “You can just be whoever you want to be here,” she said.
You May Also Like
The name comes from the Taíno culture, something akin to “hello” or “welcome” — she chose it as a tribute to her Mexican and Dominican heritage. “It is definitely a little bit of a love letter to my roots,” she said, a personal history that when she unearthed it reframed piercing altogether.
While many practitioners discover body modification through punk or alternative culture, she found herself drawn to the role it played within Taíno traditions. “They did piercings to grieve, to celebrate, for any occasion,” she said. “It could be something super deep and meaningful, or it could just be, ‘This is what I like, and this is part of my identity.’”
That perspective shapes her work today. Whether a client arrives after a divorce, to mark a birthday or simply because a piece of jewelry caught their eye, the ritual deserves the same level of care.
Nestled inside Sola Salons — a network of private salon suites designed for independent beauty and wellness professionals — in the East Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, Tau brings something more difficult than just a new a lease: trust. Mariano’s client book is deep, cultivating a following that moved with her from studio to studio. One client, she said, has been pierced by her at every location she has worked.
It’s a dynamic akin to luxury hairstylists, tattoo artists and colorists, where loyalty increasingly belongs to the practitioner rather than the name on the lease. “They come for me,” she said. “They say, ‘I don’t trust anybody else.’”
The relationship comes as piercing has grown into an increasingly robust retail category, spanning Maria Tash’s luxury fine jewelry model and newer specialty concepts like Studs and Rowan. Marino said her Tau concept was informed by trips to Brazil, where she noticed independent beauty professionals thriving in private suites rather than traditional storefronts.
The model offered her a more attainable entry point into New York real estate while preserving the slower cadence she was cultivating. “This way I can take my time with people,” she said, with appointments lasting close to an hour to discuss styling ideas, jewelry and after care.
Since opening in March, roughly 90 percent of Tau’s business comes from returning clients. Increasingly appointments culminate not in a single piercing but in the gradual construction of a jewelry wardrobe, with clients returning over months — and often years — to build curated ears that evolve alongside them.
“It’s a very intimate experience; it’s just you and me, so we get to know each other,” she said, often reading an ear much the way a stylist reads a wardrobe. Anatomy comes first, followed by lifestyle, healing considerations and the pieces a client already owns before she begins proposing placements.
Piercing services generally range from $20 to $50, while jewelry spans roughly $40 to $250. Curated ears remain the studio’s most requested service, followed by nostril piercings. Ember Body Jewelry, Buddha Jewelry and Mettle and Silver are among Tau’s bestselling brands, while yellow gold continues to resonate most strongly with her clientele.
“A lot of people don’t know the difference between a safe piercing and an unsafe piercing,” said Mariano, who regularly attends Association of Professional Piercers conferences, viewing education as fundamental to her craft. “Whenever I’m educating a client, I think, ‘What would I have liked to have heard?’”
Her commitment to education reaches beyond the studio as well.
After attending national conferences, she became acutely aware of both the lack of diversity within the profession and the financial barriers that prevent many emerging piercers from accessing continuing education.
She initially helped launch the idea of an industry scholarship before turning her attention to Piercers of Color mixers, gatherings that bring together piercers, apprentices, studio owners and other professionals to build relationships outside the conference circuit. Her goal is to formalize the initiative as a nonprofit focused on scholarships, mentorship and professional support.
“I already know the hardships of the industry and being a person of color,” she said. “We don’t need more of that. We need joy.”
