You may think tattoos look cool now, Peaches, but they'll be hell to get rid of (and it'll cost you thousands)

Tattoo trouble: Peaches Geldof has the name of her soon-to-be ex-husband on her wrist

As a cool 21- year- old, Leanne Young thought there was nothing more desirable than a series of increasingly dramatic tattoos.

'I loved the way they looked. I liked people commenting on them. The process was almost addictive - I even liked the pain,' she says.

Now, as a 34-year-old mother of two, working as a relationship counsellor, she sees them as more tat than tattoo.

The patterns and images, pricked indelibly with a range of crude dyes into her arms, legs, shoulders and back, have proved the most expensive mistake of her life.

She spent around £300 having them put on, but more than £10,000 so far on trying to get them removed.

'I really regret ever having them done in the first place. It was a huge mistake and over time I started to hate each and every one of them. Worse still, every time I got dressed or had a shower I could see them. I wanted rid of them and had no idea it was going to be so difficult, painful and expensive.'

She is not alone. Every year thousands of people, many of them teenagers, have their bodies permanently tattooed. Despite the fact at least half of them subsequently regret it, some almost immediately, the numbers queuing up for body art are growing rapidly.

Since the Seventies, the number of tattoo studios nationwide has rocketed from little more than 50 to around 1,000.

It is also increasingly big business for Britain's plastic surgeons who deal with the physical and psychological damage as patients struggle with the scarring and skin discoloration caused in the effort to remove the designs - and the stress caused by repeated job rejections and the critical judgment of others.

In the past, tattoos were the preserve of sailors and servicemen. Now, most recently, with Peaches Geldof, Angelina Jolie, and David and Victoria Beckham displaying their inky adornments, and even Samantha Cameron, the wife of the Tory leader, flashing a discreet dolphin on her ankle, tattoos have become a must-have accessory.

But few of those handing over hundreds of pounds to receive intricate and often highly artistic designs on their bodies have any idea of the horror that could await them if they change their minds.

Apart from a lack of awareness of the soaring rates of hepatitis and other blood-borne infections which may be spread by the cheaper, less well-run establishments (only last September in Wales, teenagers who attended a tattoo 'party' needed medical treatment after their tattoos became infected), many tattoo customers are also blissfully unaware of how difficult it will be to get a tattooed image removed.

In recent years the advent of surgical lasers has led many private clinics to advertise 'instant' tattoo removal.