Beauty Tips from the Pros: Plucky Eyebrows

April 10, 2008— -- When you think of Brooke Shields, Audrey Hepburn, Bette Davis, Sophia Lore, and Elizabeth Taylor, what do you picture? Their eyebrows!

What about Groucho Marx and Oscar the Grouch? Brows!

If your eyes are the mirror of your soul, then your brows are their frames. Your eyebrows are one of THE most defining features of your face and you want to get them 'right'. Eyebrows seem to say a lot about your character, long before you open your mouth to speak!

Perfectly groomed eyebrows give the fastest refresher that will always brighten your expression. I have a mission and that is to put an end to incorrect tweezing: those tufts, tadpoles, triangles, and caterpillars will easily be trends of the past.

There are several ways to weed out stray brow hairs with waxing, threading, cream removers and even lasers. But I strongly encourage everone to get used to the basics of using tweezers, either as their first plan of action and also for maintenance between 'tune-ups' for the other options. If you can have a professional shaping first, then try to keep up with what the technician did, then all the better. Please, I advise you NOT shave your brows! It is not pretty, and grows back like a mini-beard.

Basics Brow Know-Hows

The best rule of thumb is to first consider your own natural brow shape, not tweeze too much or too many at a time, never tweeze when you are bored, angry, tired, or in a moving vehicle! Seriously. You could end up with bald patches that can take months to grow back.

It's important to be in a well lit area, have a good mirror -- hopefully, one you can get right in front of, and have a really great, precision pair of tweezers. Make sure that the actual ends -- the tips that grasp the hairs -- meet snugly together to assure that when you grasp the hair, it will come out the first time without tugging and irritating your skin.

Here are the general guide points to consider.

1. Map out the beginning, middle and the end of where you want your brows to ultimately be and stick with it.

2. Start at the outer part of brows and work in toward the nose.

3. Tweeze from below only, and take only one hair at a time.

4. Step away from the mirror and get a look from five feet away to get a more objective look at your progress. It is important to keep both brows balanced, so I like to jump back and forth between each brow, always keeping symmetry in mind. Also, make sure you clean out those little fuzzy hairs between your brows, or those that don't quite blend into the overall shape of the brow.

I see people snipping long brow hairs, but I try to avoid that, as it can look too bristly and it will be rare that you need to tweeze hairs above the brows.

Once you are pleased with the shape -- step back from the mirror, look to see that they are symmetrical and then stop!

If necessary, fill in with a brow pencil or powder, but you don't have to go too dark or heavy.

Brush upward, and set into place with clear mascara! Voila, beautiful brows!

QUICK TIP TAKE AWAYS

* Before you begin, squeeze your tweezers and look to see that the ends meet firmly together to assure a good grip on the hairs.

* Grasp ONE hair at a time firmly and pull quickly.

* Tweeze hair in the direction it grows for the least irritation to the follicle.

* Do NOT wear other makeup when tweezing, as this could upset the balance of your features in the long run.