30 Days of Beauty, Day 16: Shaping and Filling Brows
The shape of your eyebrows affects not only the look of your eyes, but also of your entire face. When shaping your brows, you want to keep their basic natural shape but groom them so that they appear more refined. Whether you are simply trimming your brows or performing a whole brow overhaul, proper brow shaping requires patience and the right tools. You will want to shape them depending on your unique face structure, which will help you find not only the perfect shape but will determine how wide your brows should be and how they should be colored (if at all).
Thicker v. Thinner Brows
When shaping your brows, it's important to decide what thickness will best frame your eyes and positively emphasize your facial features. As a basic rule, those with smaller faces or softer features will be best suited by a thinner brow. Those with fuller faces or more defined features can have a thicker brow. You may also want to consider your brow bone itself, as those with higher-set brow bones should use a thicker brow to offset them.
Above everything, do not overpluck! As Moxie from Moxie Reviews says: “over-plucked eyebrows are not a flattering look.” Over plucking can also age your look and, as you age the hair might not come back . Cindy Ingalls from Prime Beauty notes: “Once you hit your 30?s, you’ll want to be careful not to overpluck your eyebrows since brows are less apt to grow back if you excessively pluck.”
Basic Brow Shaping Steps
Below are some basic tips to help you with your brow shaping. It is important to make sure that you are maintaining your natural brow shape as you work, since an unnatural shape can be very obvious.
1. Before you begin, it's important to determine where your eyebrows should begin, arch, and end. To achieve the most natural affect, place a pencil or similar object against the outside edge of the ball of your nose straight up against the brow. Your brow should start where the pencil touches it. To find your arch, move the pencil over so that it crosses over the middle of your pupil. For a more exaggerated arch, you can move the pencil to the farthest edge of your pupil, but be careful not to move it too far as this can make your arch appear unnatural. To find where your brow should end, place the pencil at the outside of your nose and line it up with the outer corner of your eye. Many people find it helpful to draw these three points on to their eyebrows using a white eyeliner pencil or similar tool. This can be especially helpful if you have limited experience with brow shaping.
2. Once you have determined these three points, you are ready to begin. You might want to trim the top hairs with small beauty scissors, clipping them down so that they fit the brow shape. To determine if your brows need a trim, use a small eyebrow brush or a similar tool to brush the hairs straight up. Any hairs that stand out from your natural shape can be trimmed down to give your brows a more refined appearance.
3. The tools you are using will make a difference as to your technique, so make sure you are comfortable with them. For most beginners, tweezers might be the best option as they allow you greater control over your brow shaping. Begin underneath your natural brow, tweezing any hairs that do not fit the shape. Using the three points of your brow, pluck any hairs that are outside of them. It's important that you do not pluck too much hair from above your brow, as this can cause you to lose your natural arch and can be harder to fix.
Makeup Tips For Brows
Kelly from Vampy Varnish provides this great tip for filling in brows with makeup:
“Sometimes filling in eyebrows can be stressful because they aren't always perfectly even. One way I found to get them as even as possible is to A. start filling them in just lightly "drawing" the line under the brow on both sides. B. then outline the top of your brow. C. step back and look straight on into a mirror and also tilt your head back to see how even it looks. D. then fill the outlined eyebrows in. Check again for evenness and you should be good to go!”
Don’t like using pencil? Cindy observes that “brow powder applied with a stiff slant brush looks more natural than pencil. There’s nothing worse than drawn on brows.”
Looking for some great brow tools? Check out the Anastasia line of brow products for everything that you need.
Tomorrow: Day 17, Choosing and Using Foundation.
