This week Lil Uzi Vert debuted a gigantic 10-carat pink diamond in the middle of his forehead. Details beyond that have been spotty, but they include a since-deleted tweet where Uzi, photographed with blood dripping from the piercing, claimed he needed the diamond removed carefully or else he could die. (He’s since clarified that he and the diamond are both intact.) So, we had to wonder: how exactly is that thing attached?
Piercer Sean Dowdell told GQ that it's possible to embed gems pretty much anywhere on the body using small metal posts with a thin, wide base that gets anchored under the skin. This technique, which is called a microdermal or transdermal implant (depending on the size of the anchor foot), exposes a threaded post that jewelry can be screwed onto. It typically only works for objects up to about eight millimeters. Uzi's pink diamond is…much larger than that. A bigger, heavier gem risks bending the post or causing infection—in one of the better scenarios. The worst? “If he got hit in the face, it would rip half his forehead off,” Dowdell says.
Uzi, however, seems to be using what's called a surface piercing to get the diamond onto his face. A surface piercing, which can also be done just about anywhere on the body, looks a little like an upside-down staple: the needle pierces the skin, makes a 90-degree turn, and emerges an inch or so from where it entered. Surface piercings are typically not connected on the outside—most often people attach a little silver ball or jewel to each end, a style Uzi has worn in the past. According to celebrity piercer Brian Keith Thompson, it is possible to attach something onto a surface piercing—he's done it—but he's never seen it done for something so large, and he isn't optimistic about the healing process for Uzi's diamond. A fitful night of sleep or even a kiss at the wrong angle can cause the body to reject a surface piercing, which could take over a year to heal.
But there's another way Uzi could have done this: Stick the diamond to his head like a fridge magnet. Dowdell says the safer option for heavy pieces like Uzi’s diamond is to magnetize the posts or even subdermally implant a small magnet underneath his skin. This would let Uzi more easily remove the gem at night—or, say, wash his face or put a shirt on. Like those fancy Apple laptop chargers, if the diamond were dislodged it would fall off Uzi's face, rather than being ripped off.
But Uzi seemed to refer to the diamond being firmly attached, which, combined with some shots where it looked slightly off-center, leads us to believe that thing is likely on there with more than some charged ions. So why would someone risk his forehead skin to attach himself permanently to a $24 million gem? Probably to prioritize the diamond’s own safety: Dowdell says that if Uzi used magnets, a heavy piece like that would probably fall off if he jumped around enough. Uzi, who said on an Instagram Live that he’d spent three years saving up for the piece and that it cost more than his cars and house combined, probably just wanted a surefire way to keep it safe.
If risking forehead skin for the sake of jewelry seems like an iffy decision, keep in mind that we're talking about a $24 million forehead diamond. It's uncharted territory.