Lip Piercings

A form of body piercing that is growing in popularity is that of lip piercing. From the rich and the famous to the not so famous, both men and women are turning to lip piercing as a means of self expression. The lip piercing features a fairly quick and painless recovery period and there is literally a plethora of choices from rings to bar bells to captured beads. All of these allow one to freely express them selves in a different way every day of the year provided that they have enough jewelry.


There are a variety of piercing locations all along the upper and lower lips that provide a wide variety of choices for unique combinations that fit your style the best.

A Lip piercing is a type of body piercing which penetrate the lips, or the area surrounding the lips. The lips and surrounding area can be pierced in a variety of ways. Of the possible piercing locations available, the ones that are most commonly referred to are those of the Monroe, Medusa and labrets.

The Monroe lip piercing techniques gets its name from the famous Marilyn Monroe upper lip mole. These piercing are done with a flat-backed labret stud and it is pierced into the upper lip at the gum line.

The Medusa piercing technique also goes on the upper lips, but rather than being off-set to one side, the piercing is done trough the center of the lip in the region known as the philtrum which is the part of the lips centered just under the nostrils.

The Labret piercing can further be separated into different types. The first type of labret piercing is those on the upper lip similar to that of the Monroe piercing but there is no particular placement. Basically, if it is not localized for a Monroe piercing, then it is just a standard labret piercing.

The next sub-section of the labret piercing are the vertical labrets. The vertical labrets go in at the center of the lower lips and then come out just at the lower edge of the jaw line. This type of piercing should not be confused with the mandible piercing which goes behind the teeth and out the bottom.

Next you have the horizontal piercing which goes in at one point of the lips and out at another point. These are fairly rare piercing and they involve two piercing instead of one.

Lip piercing can also be done in sets which are known as bites. In the bites style of lip piercing, there are usually two piercing and two studs on opposite sides of the lips. When these pairs of piercing are on the upper lip they are known as angelbites whereas when they are located on the lower lips they are most commonly referred to as snakebites. There is also the venombites in which the lower lips piercing are located close together. You also have the caninebites in which a angelbite piercing is combined with a snakebite piercing but rather than using 4 studs, the upper piercing holes are studded to the lower holes. Finally there is the spiderbites which places three piercing, one in the center and two off to either side in equal distances from the first.