Japan invades!

I have always loved the casual luxury of LeSportsac purses and bags. The company has yet to disappoint me in the variety department, as every style bag they sell comes in a number of funky patterns. The newest prints to grace these nylon canvases come from Italian artist Simone Legno, founder of the Tokidoki brand (fun to say, and it means "sometimes" in Japanese) . Although unavailable online at this time, items from the Spring 2006 collection can be found at LeSportsac retailers worldwide (and on eBay, of course). Although I think that Legno's work is worth mentioning regardless, it pertains to body modification in that her purses from the Summer LeSportsac Tokidoki collection feature the elegantly tattooed Japanese women that are often depicted in her artwork. You can also find her art on t-shirts, iSkins, skateboard decks, and in various advertisements.
I have recently noticed a huge increase in the number of ads, especially in fashion magazines, that use body modification to help promote their products. I'm not the only one who sees this phenomenon occurring, and I'm probably not the only one stumped as to what it means for modification and the way it is perceived by Western society. Does it perhaps foreshadow that fine art tattoos will one day become nothing more than a fashion commonality, like earlobe piercing? Or on the less extreme level, does it mean that even plain-skinned audiences find body modification enticing? I can't be sure, but I applaud designers who incorporate tattoos and piercings into their work regardless simply because I love flaunting the modified bling they create.