If your eyes are your most eloquent feature, then your eyebrows are the most animated. By raising or dipping slightly, they completely alter the expression of your face, from stern to shocked to perfectly serene. Eyebrows frame the face and create clear boundaries for eye makeup, which is why keeping them well-groomed and shaped is essential. On a purely aesthetic level, picture the faces of the following bold & famous brow babes: Brooke Shields, Salma Hayek, and Cara Delevingne. The best brows are natural-looking and shaped to compliment your eyes and face shape.
Getting Gorgeous Brows
Whether you want your brows to be thin and delicate or full and more natural-looking (trending), consider these professional brow-shaping methods. Keep in mind that thinner eyebrows will require more maintenance.
- Waxing: Faster than tweezing but less precise and more painful.
- Lasts 2-8 weeks
- Ideal for women with bushy, unruly brows or untouched.
- Threading: Like tweezing, threading lifts hair directly from the follicle.
- Lasts 2-8 weeks
- This procedure is quicker and more precise than waxing and relatively painless.
- Tinting: Eyebrow tinting can put the finishing touches on a new hair color.
- Lasts 3-4 weeks
- Tinting your brows makes a difference in a matter of minutes.
- Microblading: A semi-permanent cosmetic treatment that fills in brows with hair-like strokes.
- Lasts 1-3 years
- Ideal for thinning or sparse brows.
- The color fades over time, and an initial touch-up five weeks later. Yearly touch-ups to maintain optimal results.
- Microshading: Often called the ‘Shadow-Effect‘ for giving an ombre appearance with semi-permanent pigment.
- Lasts 2-3 years
- Ideal for oily and sensitive skin.
Professional Brow Shaping
I have trusted Armineh & Vivian of Edmund James Salon with my brow shape since I was in my late teens. The Wellington wax and threading gurus artfully shape brows to the point that your face looks more open, uplifted and symmetrical. It wasn’t until I began working at NM Boca Raton that I discovered the South Palm Beach County’s brow goddess, Jeri. She has since opened a salon, Expert Brows & More By Jeri, in East Boca Raton on Palmetto Park Road. Benefit Brow Bar offers brow styling, waxing and tinting services at a participating Ulta near you. I recently opted for the microshading method (HELLO, Oily Skin Gals!) with JOD Beauty Salon and will be giving you a detailed report of my impressive results.
Tweezing Your Brows
Plucking is a precise art that requires a sense of proportion, patience, and the proper tools. Trying to shape your brows with a pair of weak or unaligned tweezers is maddening. Eyebrow experts recommend using flat tweezers with a slanted edge to grab hair strands efficiently and reliably. The Best Tweezers. And most important, if you’ve overplucked, force yourself to put away your tweezers for three to four weeks to let your brows grow out.
Here’s how to go from fuzzy to sleek:
Filling In Brows
My resident makeup artist, Nicole Bulter, was the first to convince me to fill in my brows to pull together a look. When she created my first Trish McEvoy shadow palette, she was sure to include a deep brown powder to give a subtle, natural color to my brows. If your eyebrows are light and sparse, add depth by filling in brows with a pencil, powder or gel.
Whether you prefer to leave your brows in the hands of a professional or choose a D.I.Y. approach, make sure you keep a good brow-groomed. Many makeup artists assert that if your brows are in good shape, you need minimal makeup to look polished and pulled together. A bold brow paired with a great lippie, there is no better combo. Get gorgeous and put your best brow forward.
