I have an eyebrow obsession. Some people have good hair days… I have good eyebrow days.
I tend to be vain about them, too. That’s why I couldn’t resist taking this photo last night – chillin’ in bed with the kiddos, I realized that my eyebrows were quite awesome. So of course I Instagrammed the picture and tagged it #goodeyebrowday.
I know, I’m very strange.
Now you may be asking yourself, What’s the secret to perfect eyebrows? Well, there really isn’t a secret at all. You just need to remember three things:
1. Your eyebrow shape has been pre-designed to perfectly frame your eyes and provide expression to your face. Balance and proportion are what the human eye perceives as beautiful, so always work with your natural shape vs. trying to tweeze them into an unnatural arch.
2. If you have gone overboard and tweezed your brows into thin lines (or the dreaded “comma” shape), grow them back. Many women will claim that after over-tweezing, their eyebrows won’t grow back. However, unless you’ve been tweezing for 30+ years, it’s hard to permanently damage the hair follicle.
You just need to be super patient (re-growth can take up to 6 months) and put up with unpolished brows for a season or two. This past winter, I successfully grew back 30% of my brows by leaving them alone.
3. Regardless of your eyebrow state, use a brow pencil or brow powder to define the shape and fill in sparse areas. You’ll need a steady hand, and a lot of practice. (Hint: if you look like Groucho Marx, wipe if off and start again.) You can even purchase handy eyebrow stencils (yes, stencils!) from Sephora, but I don’t prefer them as they force you to create a new shape vs. defining your own.
Here are my tools of the trade:
Tweezerman Tweezer. Positively the finest general use tweezer in the world – top eyebrow artists always recommend the original Slant tweezer for expert brow shaping. The perfectly aligned, hand-filed tips grab every hair, every time with true precision.
CoverGirl Brow & Eyemakers Pencil. Create beautiful brows with this incredibly versatile pencil. It has a soft hue and powdery finish, and offers the perfect amount of coverage when applied with a light, feathery stroke. Best of all, the two-pack of pencils retails for about $5.00!
My very best tip when using an eyebrow pencil is to ensure your brows are darker than your hair colour. The biggest mistake I see is when women use a light or medium brown eyebrow pencil/powder when they have dark brown or blonde hair. Even natural blondes have dark brown brows, people! Stick to midnight brown and you’ll be good to go, regardless of your hair colour.
Do you have questions about shaping or filling eyebrows? I’m here to help! After years of obsessing over my own, I consider myself quite the expert on the subject.
You have the most perfect eyebrows! Great post- thanks for sharing your tips.
Aw, thanks Julie!!
We share the same tools of the trade! You do have fantastic eyebrows!
A woman who understands my plight! Awesome, Victoria!
You do have good eyebrows! Guess what? I’ve been plucking my eyebrows for over 30 years and I really don’t have to do it anymore; I just grab stray hairs now and then!
Yes, I think about 30 years is when the follicles surrender to the tweezer!!
very beautiful eyebrows!
Thanks Nicky :)
Great post !
I do hate to be a party pooper, but my natural eyebrow colour is so light it almost looks like I don’t have eyebrows !
They have never been dark my whole life – I had strawberry blonde hair as a kid, and now it is (of course) sprinkled with silver, but my eyebrows have always been a very very pale, blend in with the skin tone type of strawberry blonde :)
I have always used a very light brown eyebrow pencil or powder :)
LOL you’re not a party pooper – in fact, I should have clarified – only strawberry blondes, light redheads or platinum blondes tend to have lighter brows… but collectively, y’all represent less than 8% of the population :)
Light brown pencil is very appropriate for you!
my eyebrows are horrible.
I’ve been checking out your Instagram photos and they’re not horrible at all!
Thanks for the tips have never been good at doing my own
It takes a steady hand and practice, but it’s easy to master!
I have to say that I pay no attention to my eyebrows but yours do look great!
Judy, you’re breaking my heart! Eyebrows are like the most important thing to me, LOL
Love your brows! I try to maintain mine as best as I can between waxes.
That’s awesome that you get them professionally shaped. Way to go!
Thanks for the tips!
You’re very welcome!
I used to be terrible about overplucking but I have gotten better with age and experience. Love your brows!
I pretty much had NO eyebrows in my late teens, because the grunge “no-eyebrow” look was in :)
I’ve done the dreaded over tweezing many times, lol. I found threading works better for me.
I’ve never tried threading, but it does give beautiful results!
Awesome tips Lena, I’ll have to share with my daughter in college. She’s a plucker.. she could use some of your wonderful advice :)
Thank you Darlene :)
You do have pretty much perfect brows :) I am very much one guilty of having plucked my brows down over the years – and they honestly do not grow back that well anymore! Hopefully if I leave them for long enough I can get something back :)
I had to leave my eyebrows alone for about 6 months before they grew in, and when they did, it was still sparsely. I think it’s takes a long, long time to see regrowth…
Good tips and nice eyebrows!
I generally just go to the salon to get mine waxed and then I just pluck stray hairs here and there when necessary.
That’s a great way to keep them looking fab!
Have tweezed and waxed my eyebrows into oblivion!! Umm, help?
Super duper patience, friend :)
Your eyebrows look amazing but due to plucking mine for over 30 years I am unable to grow them where I over plucked. I am definitely going to look for this CoverGirl Brow Pencil.
You will love the pencil, Suzanne – it’s so natural looking!
I love your brows!
Thank you Athena!
Your eye brows are so nice and perfect, i ruined mine years ago by shaving them way to far away from the arch of my nose … if i only had known i wouldn’t have ever done that uggghh .
I fill mine in close to the nose too, because they’re very hard to grow back once they’ve been plugged there :(
I am struggling to get my eyebrows to match..and am too cheap to go to a professional lol But I have recently let my brows grow out and am going to just take a little off at a time..I find if I take a bit and leave it then I notice later where I need to pluck to get them to match better.. Oh the eyebrow struggle!! lol
I hear you! A little at a time is definitely the way to go!
Your eyebrows look awesome! Thanks for these great tips!
You’re welcome Amy!
Thanks for the tips, I need to change my comma’s
Oh dear… eye pencil can definitely help with commas!
You have a beautiful face, eyebrows included lol.
Aw, thanks Stephanie!
great tips, Lena. I need to re-claim my eyebrows by using some brow powder. Beautiful :)
Go Branka! I think we should ALL use a little brow powder or pencil!
Wait until you get older and you start getting these mutant eyebrows that grow 2 -3 times longer than usual.
Until I actually started filling in my eyebrows, I didn’t know what I was missing. They look so much better filled!
Your brows look great! I find that brows are the hardest makeup to do right. I’m a very light blonde and my brows are a combo of white blonde and medium brown. So annoying!
I don’t know how you can draw your brows on so perfectly because I’d never be that good.