There are very few aspects of my appearance that I haven’t messed around with through the years. Blame vanity, insecurity, boredom or some toxic combination of all three. I’ve been bleaching my hair since I was 14; when I worked at a fashion magazine, I once had an obscure quinoa protein treatment sponged onto my scalp to make said hair softer and shinier (it worked, in case you’re wondering). I’ve over fake-tanned to the extent that it has probably seeped into my bloodstream. I’ve even faffed around fruitlessly with a gua sha, under the delusion that it might give me some semblance of a jawline. But there is one beauty rule I have never, ever broken: don’t mess with your natural eyebrows.
I can’t quite remember exactly when I learned this beauty adage – it’s not like my mum ever sat me down to pass on eyebrow-related warnings, and I probably wouldn’t have listened even if she did. There is, however, a reasonably high likelihood that I saw this precept in a teenage magazine and took it to heart thereafter (much like everything else I read in the likes of Mizz and Bliss – for me, these publications were like tablets bearing biblical scripture, but with posters of Gareth Gates as an added bonus). This would have been the early Noughties, so the beauty advice I devoured would probably have been put together by a woman who’d plucked their own brows into obscurity during the previous decade, and then lived to regret it.
The most important tenet of this old-school eyebrow gospel? Never, ever pluck anything at the top of the brow’s arch, for risk of ruining the shape. Of course, I can’t claim to have never picked up the tweezers to get rid of some annoying strays, but I always stuck to the rubric and only got rid of hairs below or between the natural brows. It’s stood me in decent stead, and means that when I glance back at old photos, the one thing, no, two things, that don’t make me cringe are my eyebrows (my fashion choices and stripy highlights are another matter altogether). Even if the colour of whatever pencil or gel I’ve used to tidy things up might look a little bit off (depending on what shade of aforementioned stripy highlights I’d been trying to match or contrast), the shape is generally timeless.
But it’s certainly been tempting to stray – because for most of my adult life, beauty culture has been obsessed with the concept of the perfect brow. In the Nineties and Noughties, maintenance meant zealously plucking, often until you were left with a slender, almost Marlene Dietrich-style line. “When I began to specialise in brows over two decades ago, the industry as we know it was in its infancy,” says Shavata Singh, founder of luxury brow and lash salons across the UK and her own eponymous product brand. “The limited range of products focused on defining and enhancing brows with pencils and powders in only light or dark, which tended to create an artificial look. Shape was considered to be very much a DIY affair, with many women using stencils to try and create a specific brow shape, usually with disastrous results.”
Things got a lot more involved in the 2010s. Cara Delevingne’s full, fluffy arches seemed to launch her modelling career at the start of that decade, reversing decades of beauty norms in the process (although it’s worth noting that a fuller, more sculpted brow had long been the preference in Middle Eastern and Asian communities). Luxuriant brows became a status symbol; mathematically crafted arches proliferated on Instagram, crowning endless celebrity selfies.
In 2015, a survey suggested that British women were spending £200 annually on treatments; the following year, The Guardian declared brows to be “the beauty obsession of the decade”. Working in fashion and beauty, I sifted through countless product launches: double-ended pencils with snazzy retractable tips, tiny palettes filled with pomade and powder designed to set and fill the brows, complete with Borrower-sized angled brushes. The holy grail product was the Dipbrow from Anastasia Beverly Hills, the brand set up by Anastasia Soare, a brow artist who reportedly counted Cindy Crawford and Naomi Campbell among her earliest clients, and famously tended to Kim Kardashian.
It was a time when you only had to duck into your nearest branch of Urban Outfitters or Topshop (RIP) to be bombarded with T-shirts and assorted stationery bearing the slogan “brows on fleek” (a phrase that originated in a video posted online by a then 16-year-old named Kayla Lewis). You’d find them among the jumpers inexplicably embroidered with moustaches and the ubiquitous pineapple statuettes.
It’s no wonder we all collectively fell for this particular beauty dream. Eyebrows are often one of the first things we notice about someone, as they’re so integral to how we communicate our thoughts and feelings. “We express a lot of our emotions through our eyebrows, and they can completely transform our face,” says Emmy Clayton, expert lash and brow artist. Even “the slightest natural enhancement to the texture, colour and shape” can “make a dramatic difference”, adds permanent makeup expert Laura Kay, who notes that this “can be especially true as we age”. An arched shape appears to lift and open up the eyes, counteracting the sagging effect that can set in when we get older (and it’s certainly cheaper than injectables or surgery).
We express a lot of our emotions through our eyebrows, and they can completely transform our face
Now, the treatment menu at your local beauty salon or brow bar will be teeming with hi-tech options. Microblading is “a very popular choice that creates the look of natural, fine hair strokes using a small blade with tiny needles, giving you the appearance of fuller brows”, according to Kay, while “nanoblading is a similar technique but uses even finer needles, allowing for even more realistic, detailed strokes”. Brow extensions involve tiny synthetic hairs being attached to the skin or the brow. There are also powder or ombré brows, a semi-permanent solution designed to ape the look of powdered makeup. “This is ideal if you are looking to achieve a bolder or more filled-in style,” Kay adds.
Brow lamination, a process that sets the hairs into place, usually lifting them for a brushed-up look, seems especially popular right now. Open TikTok and it’s not hard to find at-home tutorial videos (some of them even use glue sticks, a technique popularised in the drag community). For all this innovation, though, most experts don’t recommend deviating far from the brow shape you were born with – essentially echoing that old advice I grew up with. “When it comes to eyebrows, your natural brow shape is inherently suited to your unique facial structure,” Kay says. Clayton agrees. “Our brows also frame our face, which is why following what you have naturally is the best option,” she adds. “When looking at Hollywood actresses and celebrities, they often have a timeless look with their brows that suit their face, without heavy makeup or trends such as lamination.”
If we veer too far from our natural arch, Clayton says, it might not sit well with your face shape, plus, “it can be difficult to keep on top of, with the regrowth looking more obvious”. Just tidying up with tweezers, she adds, “can go far” (in moderation, of course). Kay, meanwhile, recommends sticking with the “golden ratio” principle also popularised by Anastasia Soare. According to this, the eyebrow should start above the centre of the nostril, the highest point should be in line with the middle of the eye’s iris and tip of the nose, and the end should line up with the outside corner of the eye and nostril. Grab a ruler (or anything with a long, straight edge) if you’re struggling to visualise it.
For all the trends and new technologies, then, it seems like brows are one facet of the beauty world where simple tends to equate to better. I owe a lot to that wise and battle-scarred writer of those teen magazine makeover pages – over the years, their sage advice has saved me a whole lot of time, money and potential embarrassment.
