Brow Wow

One important feature that often gets overlooked is eyebrows. Think of your face as a picture, and brows as the frame. A picture, no matter how beautiful, will not look good in an inappropriate frame. It's actually amazing the difference brows can make; they change your entire look. Therefore, we must make sure that our brows are the right shape. Now, there may often be a difference between the brows you have and the brows you want. A lot of people name off celebrities as their inspiration for their brows. And while it's not necessarily a bad thing, remember that each face has different proportions and that your eyebrows must first and foremost suit your face.

Just look at the difference when Keira Knightley's brows are changed:


Yes, there are certain places where your eyebrows should begin and end, and this is determined according to certain guidelines. (What?? There are guidelines for eyebrows??) If brows are too short on the outside ends, it makes the face appear wider. If they are too short in the inner ends, then it makes the nose appear larger. Neither of those are desirable qualities.

There's a very simple way to prevent this. Take an eye pencil (preferably white) and line it up with the middle of your nostril. That is where the eyebrow should begin. Make a small mark.


Now line up the pencil with the outside edge of your nose and the outside edge of your eye. This is where the brow should end. Make another small mark.


Then line the pencil up with the middle of your nostril with your pupil, and that's where the arch of the eyebrow should be. Make a mark here, as well. (Haha, I know I look high in this picture, but I was too lazy to take another one). =D


It also helps to outline the parameters of the brow shape you want with white eyeliner (according to the guidelines you just marked, of course, so that you don't accidentally pluck a hair you didn't mean to. There's a fine line between keeping your brows in shape and obsessive plucking; there's no need to pluck them more than once a week. Also be sure to step back from the mirror after each pluck to look at the eyebrows overall. Sometimes we tend to focus too much on individual hairs, and we end up removing more than we intended (which is also why lining the outside of the brows with white pencil is helpful). Remember that the two eyebrows don't have to be perfectly the same; they're sisters, not twins.


After plucking, brush your brows up and use sharp manicure scissors to trim any long hairs. This keeps them groomed and neat-looking, not bushy. If you have Asian ancestry, your brows may have a tendency to grow down, so brush them downwards, and trim them.

If you have sparse areas in your brows, it's important to fill them in. Otherwise, you brows look uneven. You can use brow pencils and lightly feather in color. Make sure to choose a color that matches your brow color or is a bit lighter than your hair color. You don't want to look like Groucho Marx.

My favorite way to fill in brows, however, is to take an angled brush and use matte shadow that matches your brows. Shadow is much softer and more natural than using pencil, and usually provide the best look.


For those you of you who have seriously sparse brows, a waterproof brow corrector is the way to go. These give the longest lasting results but take a while to master. I usually put a small dab of corrector on the back of my hand and dip a stiff, angled brush and work with it until it the consistency is like marker. Then I lightly feather it into the brow.


There are also several different methods of doing your brows. There's plucking, of course, probably the most convenient yet least efficient method that most people resort to. There's waxing, painful, but quick. And there's a lesser known method, threading, that is sort of a cross between the two and a method I find great for those with sensitive skin (or those of us who just can't handle the pain, like my mother).


Thanks for reading, and please comment!!