How To Shape Your Eyebrows | Make Up Tips, Tricks and Techniques

You know these people can that don't pay much attention to what their glasses look like can be surprised when you remind them that they are the first thing people notice about them? The same goes for you eyebrows. They seem to be in the background and are often overlooked, but they are a critical feature. They provide essential architecture to your face and should be strong, defined and clean. But also natural. You never want to turn your brows into something they're not. Your best look will probably mean working with the brow shape you were born with. Sometimes subtle tweaks like simply cleaning up below the brow can make all the difference; other times you'll need to do some serious preening.. no one looks cute with a unibrow. 

Finding your arch can be difficult. I strongly recommend going to a beauty specialist and then maintain them afterwards. This is much easier than doing it from scratch yourself. I don't like getting my brows waxed. I prefer getting plucked or threaded. 

If you are going to take on this task yourself, follow these steps for narrowing in on your arches. You can also invest in a brow kit that provide stencils.

1. Take a pencil and hold it vertically against your nose. Where it hits your eyebrow is where your brow should start - anything else is a unibrow and you can feel free to pluck away.

2. Starting from the same position as step one, tilt the pencil directly across the center of your eye on a diagonal. The spot where it hits your brow is your arch. Mark it with a pencil or eyeliner. 

3. Now tilt the pencil so the tip aligns with the outer edge of your eye. Where it hits on the end is the end of your brow. mark this with a pencil.

picture from www.healthtap.com

PLUCKING:

1. Using your tweezers, pluck any hairs that are clearly well outside of the confines of your brow. Remember to keep a light hand (you want those guys to look full and natural) and pluck from underneath the hair and in the direction it grows. 

2. If you eyebrows hairs are long, you can take a brow brush and comb the, straight up. Trim the brows that go beyond the brow line with cuticle scissors. Don't cut too much!

Make no mistake, eyebrow upkeep can be tricky. It's easy to loose perspective when those tweezers are in your hand and you face is pressed up against your mirror. You can go way too far in seconds. The same can also happen when you're trying to even them out. Over plucking can lead to permanent damage. Sometimes your eyebrows can not grow back at all. Before you get pluck happy, pledge to only tug out one hair at a time - and to constantly take two steps back from the mirror to assess your work.

If you colour your hair regularly, you can ask your hairdresser to match your brow colour with your base colour.