A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

I know that some of you will be reading this with your neatly arched brows raised in curiosity at just what on Earth could be considered “terrifying” about eyebrow hair.  The rest of you (more normal types) will be reading this, twirling your brow hairs around your index finger.

Left to their own devices, mine grow like wildfire – and I’m not talking Cara Delevingne grandiose brows here; more… Dennis Healy.  Given an extra coat of brow set, you could zip wire from here to Lands End on one of mine.

This ultimately means that I take the business of beating them into submission seriously.  I’ve stopped shaping them myself because, like a two-year old with a biro, I simply cannot be trusted with a pair of tweezers and a magnifying mirror.  Instead, I get them threaded every 5/6 weeks and this is enough to keep the arch well-defined.  Preventing them from thereafter developing into McDonald’s ‘golden arches’?  Well that bit’s up to me.

These are the brow tools that I simply couldn’t live without.

01: Mascara Spoolie.  You can either buy these as purpose-built cosmetic tools or (more thriftily) clean an old mascara wand and use that instead.  Either way, a spoolie is an absolute necessity in the fight against unruly brows.  Comb through the stragglers before snipping and brush them into place before filling.

02: Brow Set/Gel.  You can buy brow set products but I use a clear mascara.  The Maybelline Great Lash in clear is perfect for the job because it holds the hairs in place without making them feel crusty and it doesn’t leave behind a telltale ‘wet look’.

03: Brow Powder.  Much easier than pencils in my opinion.  My holy grail is the Illamasqua Brow Powder but the most important thing is to find a good shade match in whatever you use and unless your brows are naturally auburn, beware of warm-toned browns.  Many women use eyeshadow… any powder is fine.

04: Sharp pair of eyebrow scissors.  These are nothing special, I bought them years ago off eBay but they’re brilliant.  Super sharp with a precise point that trims the hair without pushing them ineffectually along the blade.  Always brush the hair upward toward the hairline and trim any that stray outside of the bulk of the brow area.  Go easy, you can always trim more but you can’t stick them back on!

05: Tweezers.  I favour the brand Tweezerman for my tweezers, particularly the wide-grip style.  There’s nothing more frustrating than a pair of tweezers that fail to pluck.  Particularly when you’ve psyched yourself up to grab an eye-watering one only to find that the points have clutched at nothing more substantial than air.  Don’t be afraid to attack anything that looks like it may contribute to a mono-brow or those random ones that appear to be sprouting far closer to your eyelid than your brow-line.

06: Angled Brow Brush.  A fairly stiff brush is best for running the powder through the brow area.  Always start filling-in from the middle of the brow to avoid depositing too much product on the inner third.  Unles you’re going for the scouse brow/Katie Price look – in which case, just dispense of the brush and grab the nearest Sharpie pen.  Also, get off my blog.

What steps do you take to keep from tripping over your eyebrows?  Do you thread and then leave them be or are you a serial tweezerer?

I know it’s LFW but I’ve never been particularly fashionable.  I like clothes, a lot.  I like to buy clothes, a lot.  I just don’t know how to combine them to ‘create’ looks.  I’m truly envious of women who have an unforced style… me?  If it looks good, it tends to look like I’ve ‘tried’ really, really hard to make it look good you know?

So anyway, it’s not that I’m eschewing LFW… not at all, I love to look at the makeup from the shows… but when it comes to trends?  Completey superficial and frivolous posts on eyebrows are more my thing!

With this in mind, brow gods Tweezerman reckon they’ve got their fingers on the Brow Trends that’ll have us going “ooh nice brows” this Summer.  Don’t say that I’m the only one who “oohs” over nice eyebrows in this way… no seriously, don’t.

[stextbox id=”custom” caption=”Tweezerman say…” ccolor=”ffffff” bcolor=”b0c4de” bgcolor=”e6e6fa” cbgcolor=”b0c4de”]Brows – last season it was all about an over sized, wild & bushy brow.  This season, full brows are still on trend but now they are more tailored & groomed, the hairs aren’t as wild and often they are slightly elongated and tapered at the ends creating a touch more drama.


This Spring/Summer’s full brows have a great arch that is both feminine and strong.  Brow colour should be 1-2 shades lighter than hair colour and should be powdered across the whole brow rather than just used to fill in.  A new trend is also to highlight under the brow, which makes it look more substantial and showcases the brow perfectly.[/stextbox]

Strong brows are still in, just a little more ‘tailored’!

If you’re not blessed with a well-defined arch, Tweezerman recommend the use of a little cosmetic trickery to give the impression of a master eyebrow-raiser:

“You can use a touch of a highlight of makeup underneath the brow to create a bit of lift; a light-toned fleshy nude or very pale vanilla colour to illuminate the underneath.  You can also use your brow powder or brow pencil to emphasize the arch.”

Here are some of the most popular products on the market for emphasising a beautiful brow!

1. E.L.F Eyebrow Lifter and Filler (£3.50)
2. Clinique Instant Lift for Brows (£13.00)
3. Pixi Brow Lift (£16.00)
4. Benefit High Brow (£14.00)
5. MAC Shroom Eyeshadow (£11.50)

But what my eyebrows want to know is this… how long are they going to have to wait until curly brows are in huh?

Oh… that long?

Well in that case, I’d better stock up on mega-hold hairspray and hone my use of brow shaping scissors instead.

Do you have brow envy?

First and foremost… this ain’t my find!  The delightful Virtues of Beauty told me to try this out when I asked for some brow gel recommendations on Twitter.

I hate the normal Great Lash mascara.  Hate. It.  This stuff though?  It’s good!  Especially for the money (I paid £2.99 on eBay).

I’ve been using it to hold my CURLY (yes, curly – thanks gene pool) eyebrows in place now that I’ve finally decided that I should pay them more attention.  There’s not a huge amount to say about this product except that it works.

The bristles do a good job of combing through and coating the hairs.  I’m not keen on how long this stuff takes to dry and for that reason, it means that I have to make using this… the very last step in my makeup routine.  I’d say that it takes a good 3/4 minutes to dry fully.  Until then, you have wet brows.

Once it has dried… it thankfully doesn’t leave my eyebrows crusty.  Just sets them nicely in place and stops me looking like Dennis Healy‘s lovechild.

What do you use to keep your brows in place?

We all bemoan an eyeliner that lasts for approximately 30 minutes on the lash line, but how far would you go to ensure your makeup remained perfect throughout the day?

Following my ‘brow post’ a few weeks ago that documented my overplucked and undefined eyebrows, I started thinking more about the various options available to us in the way of permanent make up and I discovered a lady called Tracie Giles.

Tracie Giles is a certified expert in her field of permanent makeup, and one of the many treatments offered by Tracie Giles Inernational is something called Ultra Lift Eyebrows.

Tracie describes her Ultra Lift Eyebrows treatment…

The Ultra Lift technique is one I’ve developed as a response to client demand and is exclusive to Tracie Giles. The difference begins with extremely careful planning. Your new look brows are designed sympathetically to your face, to give the most flattering and natural appearance. Then, the impression of individual eyebrow hairs are interspersed among your natural hairs to reshape, balance and harmonise your brows in a way that can literally transform your face.  This technique is done under extreme magnification and is highly skilled and specialised.

The treatment usually takes around 1-2 hours (conducted over 2 sessions) and the effects last around 18 months on average before requiring a top up as the pigment begins to fade.  Permanent makeup has come a long way in recent years with many advancements in both technology and technique.  Finally gone are those tell-tale strangely auburn inks!  Thankfully replaced by custom blended mineral pigments and a “hair by hair” approach.

It’s certainly not a cheap option with prices starting from around £495 for a full brow, but it sure as hell would beat sharpening that eyebrow pencil every day.

What do you ladies think?  Is permanent makeup something you would consider?  Indeed, have you ever had any permanent makeup treatments yourself?

They’re kind of a big deal.

It’s a substantial thing to grow hair on your face.  Billions of pounds go into the development of products designed to remove facial hair, but I’m not sure we invest so much time and effort in cultivating the hair we want to keep.

Mine are a complete and shameful mess.  I’ve overplucked some areas and I continue to underpluck others…  I have a great natural arch, but no idea how to make the best of it.  Infact, I’ve managed to create total unevenness to the point where I look like I’m permanently raising one of my eyebrows when in reality, I’m not moving a muscle.

Brow powder is my makeup bag essential.  I’ll happily hit the supermarket without a scrap of colour or foundation on my face, but take away my brow powder and I’ll be walking around wih my hands self-consciously hovering near my forehead in an attempt to cover up the offending area.  Eyebrows, for me… are face framers, and KNOW that everytime I see a FOTD – I’m checking out those brows before ANYTHING else.

Obviously, this post is mostly an excuse for me to trawl the internet laughing at celebrities with dodgy eyebrows, but there is a serious message here.  Tweezers are a dangerous implement and I’m not letting Leila near a pair.  As God (or you guys)  is my witness, I’m marching her to a salon when she hits 15.  This house will be a tweezerless one.

I wish mine had been…

What a mess.  I’m a (relatively) intelligent woman who clearly lost control of all mental capabilities when my grasping fingers first touched those tweezers 13 years ago and quite frankly, I haven’t regained them.

I need help, I know that some of my lovely readers MUST be brow experts!  I see so many women with perfectly groomed eyebrows and I’m considering befriending the next one I see in Waitrose, lulling her into a false sense of security with hazelnut lattes and Heat magazine chats before slyly handing her my tweezermans and giving her carte blanche on my face.

Do you feel my pain or mock my affliction?

Where can I go from here?  Professional help?  Hands tying behind my back?  Hair transplants?  Threading?

Halp?!