Here you go.
HIGH BROWS:
Let's talk about eyebrows. Eyebrows have held great significance as far back as Ancient Egyptian times. Using black oxide and carbon paint they thought the look would prevent infection, promote good health and protect the eyes from the sun.
Since then eyebrows have become an ever-changing fashion statement and a trend to keep up with. An important part of the face their main function is to prevent sweat and other debris from falling into the eye. They also aid how we deliver expressions, something of which Botox can get in the way of. In beauty however, we have forgone the idea of them being purposeful. The brow industry is now worth billions and we are constantly trying to keep up with the latest products, treatments and trends. They have become a depiction of how you wish to present yourself. You can choose to be a perfectly manicured, product enhanced brow gal. Or maybe you have become obsessed with brow lamination, the fluffier the better and combed through with a thick spoolie of brow gel. Or maybe, like me your brows have post-traumatic stress disorder from the years of over plucking them into an oblivion that they refuse to grow back.
Brow artists have to constantly keep up with new products and treatments to be on top of their game and we, as consumers are on a never-ending cycle of finding the best brow product to satisfy our brow desires. Back in 2015 super thick and dark brows came back with a bang when Rihanna showed up on the cover of her newly released single "Bitch Better Have My Money". This caused a nationwide obsession with big statement brows. Starting off being overly drawn on and manicured then settling into the more chic and natural Glossier Boy Brow fluffy moment.
Those, like myself who lived through the over plucking obsession in school were left scrambling to figure out the best product to eradicate the fact that our brows were all but non existent. I invested a substantial amount of time, money and effort into trying to keep up with the bushy brow frenzy. Practicing my best wrist flick while holding one of the many thin nib eyebrow pencils that claimed to give the most natural looking fake hair strand. Many opted for micro-blading or got sucked into buying an overpriced serum seen on an Instagram ad. Keeping the product by your bedside at night yet still forgetting to make use of it.
I have been trying to follow and keep up with eyebrow trends but my brows just do not cooperate. Seeing as our eyebrows actual use is to stave off sweat in these warmer months, my perfectly natural drawn on brow strands turn to mush. So I've decided that I’m getting of the trendmill and am willing to accept that I have to accept what I have!
I first got a hold of my mothers tweezers age ten. I would spend my evenings as a young teen peering into one of those magnifying mirrors perched on my windowsill. I could see all my pores and every unwanted brow hair that unbeknown to me would be hugely in fashion in my later years. Plucking each one and letting them float away, never to be seen again. Searching for the Pamela Anderson high arch barely-there brow. Sometimes I'd go as far as to pluck the whole tail end and draw it back on higher with a badly sharpened Rimmel brow pencil. Using the same one to line my lips adding Vaseline to both keep my brows in place and smearing some on my lips to blend in the brown pencil. As of late I have begun to get seduced back into the thin brow phase of my youth. I’m getting older, getting Botox and facials. Watching Vogue get ready with me's to pick up whatever tips and tricks I can to try and maintain my youth. To this day I have the same magnifying mirror and the other morning I placed it on my windowsill and looked closely at myself. My last brow tint had worn off and my face was covered in Dripping Gold Wonder Water. If I rang up to book a tint I would be left with an orange hue around my brows for a couple of days. I truly dislike being tanless so I decided I'd forego the tint. Trying to figure out a rotisserie of having a bare face to prep for a tint post lockdown was just another thing on my to do list that I couldn't be arsed with. I picked up my pink Tweezerman tweezers and went to town. Trawling through Instagram beforehand looking up images from the early two thousands for some inspiration.
I've succumbed to the fact that I will never again have my pre plucked brows. So I have decided to revisit the thin brow moment that I unknowingly dedicated myself to in my teen years and it feels liberating! I will no longer try force my brows to be something that they are not. They are sparse and thin and look in a constant state of surprise post Botox but they function just fine as they are.
Brow trends will come and go but my spindly thin brows are here to stay.
don’t give her any ideas!
