Happy Monday my beauties :) I have been meaning to talk to you about brows for quite some time. Brows are super important, they define your features and add the finishing touch to your makeup. In the last few years they became a thing. We now have countless of products on the market, but the question I get asked the most is: which one to choose?
My brows and how I care for them.
Let's start with my brows. I have plenty of brow hair to play with. Jealous much? Well, let me tell you, it's not all fun and games! With plenty of hair there are certain cons to keep in mind. First of all: how unruly they are!!! My brows live their own life and if there's one thing I can count on, it's that. Long hair need trimming quite often. I tend to do it once a month but I know I should probably do it more often.
I don't over pluck. In fact I pluck very little. I don't go to a beautician and wax them either. I prefer to care for my own brows. Why? It saves me a lot of money, as it can be as pricey as £35.00 per appointment. Most importantly I avoid it simply because I always end up with either "Instagram Brow" or over plucked with an enormous arch.
I keep my brows simple and quite straight. Yes, there's a natural arch to them and I tend to keep it that way. I only pluck the hair below and keep my brow line as natural as possible. They will never look like twins and why should they? Brows are sisters, not twins and I'm happy with my natural brows.
I tend to pluck once a week and care for my brows every night with a brush of castor oil. I find it's as good as any brow serums on the market and it's cost effective.
Pencil, powder, mascara or pomade? Types of brow products.
I get asked a lot, what brow product I prefer. It's a hard question as I really like to use all of the above. For work I normally just use a pencil, quickly filling in the arch and finishing up with some brow mascara. For days, where I can spend an extra minute or two on my brows, or when I go out, I opt for pomade. The least used product would be the brow powder. I have full brows so there's not that much sparse areas that need filling in, so brow powder is never my first choice.
When shopping for brow products there's one factor that's important whatever the product. Remember to choose the shade as cool in tone as possible. There are rarely any people with naturally warm toned brows so cool tone shade will suit you better.
When choosing brow pencil it's important to get few details right. There's so many different options out there. I personally prefer the thin pencil like Soap & Glory Archery, which makes drawing individual hair super easy. It's also important to choose the right formula. The harder the pencil, the most precise it will be. Soft pencils will be much harder to use when looking for precision.
When choosing brow powder, it's all about pigmentation. Highly pigmented powder will make your work fast and easy. Try to choose powder which is fully matte as it will look the most natural on the brow.
Brow mascaras are everywhere these days. Choose one with fibres to give your brows fuller effect. The main factor to consider is the size of the brush. The smaller the brush, the easier it is to use. You want your brow mascara to dry to matte and have a pretty strong hold to keep your brows in place.
When looking for brow pomades, there's few factors to consider. The formula should be creamy and pigmented. It makes the application super easy. You should look for formula that dries pretty fast and to full matte. Waterproof is the one to go for, especially on hot summer days. Brow pomades tend to dry up pretty quickly in the pans. Storing them upside down helps a little, but your best friend would be a product such as Inglot Duraline. One drop every month or so will refresh the pomade.
Brow Pencils for blondes/ dark blondes:
Light to medium taupe shade will suit all blondes. The pencil is super thin and quite hard, making the application easy and precise. The brush on the other end completes this pencil perfectly as you can quickly brush off the excess product. My absolute fave !!!
Studio 10 Brow Lift Perfecting Liner - £22.00
Another duo, this time with dark beige liner, which is meant for cleaning up the brows after application. It's too dark for me so I only ever use the brow pencil side. The shade is perfect for blondes. It's medium to dark taupe with cool tones. It's not as precise as Archery but it does a good job. 2nd place in my book.
This duo features fairly thin brow pencil and brow powder on a sponge applicator. I quite like the brow pencil, although the colour is definitely more blonde than taupe and slightly warmer than brow pencils mentioned above. I don't like the sponge applicator dispensing the powder though. This is my least used out of the three.
Brow Powders for blondes/ dark blondes:
My newest addition to the brow family and I really enjoy using it. I mostly use the middle shade, which is a medium to dark taupe. I sometimes use the blonde shade to fill in the front, if I fancy dual tone brows. The shades are al pigmented and the add on of wax makes it a perfect palette.
Meant as a dupe for ABH Brow Book and it's a pretty decent dupe. The shades are pigmented and there's a variety that will suit anyone from lightest blonde to medium brown hair. There's plenty of cool toned taupes and browns and even slightly warm toned browns. I don't use it as much because of the size of the palette. I'm not a MUA so I don't need as many shades and tend to stick to other methods of filling in brows. FULL REVIEW & SWATCHES HERE.
Great little duo. Two shades: blonde and taupe will suit most blondes. The pigmentation is ok and it's a perfectly nice product to use. It's quite small which makes it easy for travel.
Brow Mascaras for blondes/ dark blondes:
ModelCo More Brows in Light/Medium and Medium/Dark - £13.00 each
My absolute fave brow mascaras. The formula have a lot of fibres making my brows appear fuller and it's quite good at keeping them in place. I use Light/Medium to brush up the front of my brows and Medium/Dark to keep the arch at place. Both shades are very cool toned and the mascara wand is small and makes the application easy and precise.
The formula differs here from the ModelCo mentioned above. It has a super strong hold, the strongest I've seen in brow mascaras to date so it's perfect for unruly hair. The Fairest shade is my favourite as it's very light and ashy. I'm not the biggest fan of Light/Medium as it's just too warm for my taste.
Brow Pomades for blondes/ dark blondes:
Freedom Eyebrow Pomade in Taupe and Blonde - £5.00 each
To date my favourite eyebrow pomades. Meant to be dupes for ABH Brow Pomade and in many aspects they are. I find the taupe shade truly taupe and better than taupe shade from Anastasia. After 3-5 months you will need to refresh the formula once a month with a single drop of Inglot Duraline. The formula is waterproof and it will stay on for 24 hours in high humidity if needs be. FULL REVIEW HERE.
I bought this only recently to compare with my Freedom ones and I really love the formula. It's super creamy, dries matte and it stays put for good 12 hours or so. However when compared with Freedom Taupe, the shade is lighter and has more blonde tones to it. It works great and I'm glad I've tried it but there's really no difference in formula (except for slight colour difference) to justify spending 3 times as much on the product.
Inglot AMC Brow Liner Gel in 12 - £11.00
The smallest and most travel friendly option. Again this is a very high pigmented product, as with both Freedom and ABH. The shade is also taupe, something in between of Freedom Taupe and ABH Taupe. It's got a nice hold to it, keeping your hair in place and will stay put for up to 12 hours.
If you'd like to further your brow knowledge I recommend a quick read/watch of a great article on Into The Gloss. You won't be disappointed :)
Thank You For Reading,
Love
Let's Be Friends:
You're very lucky with your brows, mine are very sparse :( But I also look after them on my own and would be totally scared to let someone do something with them, haha! I've tried different products and my favourite has to be pomade as it looks the best on my brows and non existent brow tail which I have to draw, haha! I'm using now the one from NYX but will definitely try the Freedom one. x
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