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If you had told me back in 2007, that one day runway models, my favorite celebs, and Instagram influencers (not that the app or the term "influencer" were around then, but I digress) would be flaunting bold, attention-grabbing brows, I'd have spit out my Capri Sun in pure shock and choked on my pepperoni pizza Lunchables. In no universe did I ever imagine that eyebrows like mine — dark, thick, bushy at best, unruly at worst — would ever be considered beautiful or remotely aspirational. I've felt this way as early as elementary school, and throughout my adolescence, did everything I could to try to pretend they didn't exist. I waxed (mistake), tweezed (really big mistake), and dreamed for my brows to magically get thinner and less noticeable. All of the popular girls in my school had pretty, delicate-looking arches. By comparison, mine felt distinctly unfeminine and I hated them.
However, in my early college years, a model named Cara Delevingne stepped onto the scene, instantly becoming industry royalty — with spectacular brows. Fellow well-enbrowed actors Lily Collins and Lucy Hale continued their rapid ascent to "Hot Young People" stardom and boom! All of a sudden, it seemed like everyone wanted to rock a full-on, unapologetic brow. WTF is happening, I thought, as I'd walk into a Sephora and see aisle upon aisle of pomades, pencils, gels, and powders, all formulated to play up what I'd been trying to downplay for so long.
If so many brands are investing in products to bulk up brows — with people readily buying those products en masse — then maybe what I was born with wasn't a bad thing at all. According to a 2014 report by market research firm The NPD Group, eyebrow products are a whopping $122 million industry, accounting for an estimated 11 percent of total U.S. prestige eye makeup sales. A 2018 study from the same firm also reveals continued growth rate from 2017 to 2018. Big brows aren't going anywhere, anytime soon.
As I entered my early 20s, I'd been using nothing but Anastasia Beverly Hills Clear Brow Gel on rare occasions to brush up the hairs and keep them in place. Well, call it beauty FOMO (or hell, maybe I was just starting to grow up), but I finally felt ready to start embracing my brows. First step? Figuring out which products made sense for me. I had no use for anything with a ton of pigment — if you need a visual, my brow hairs rival Joe Jonas's thick, opaque arches — so I didn't need pomades or powders.
I quickly found that tinted gels like Benefit's Gimme Brow+, Milk Makeup's Kush Fiber Brow Gel, and Eyeko's Brow Gel gave me just the right amount of definition, were easily buildable, and filled in the few sparse areas I had. Pencils remained uncharted territory until one of Benefit's global brow experts Jared Bailey sat me in his chair and gave me a lesson in brow pencils 101. Instead of filling in the entire brow, he recommended I apply the pencil along the bottom of my brow and softly outline the outer corner, creating a tapered shape that somehow made my entire face look more pulled together. Voilà! The art of subtlety.
All of that brings me to today. As someone who works in the beauty industry, I'm fully aware that in a couple of years maybe people won't be looking to bulk up their brows as much as is de rigueur today. However, even if brow products wane in popularity, it's not that I love mine now because they're trendy; they're part of what makes me me, and makeup is my way of celebrating them.
More content to brows(e):
- The Craziest Brow Art Looks on Instagram
- Women With No Eyebrows Explain Why Arches Aren't Necessary
- Thanks to Microblading, I Finally Have My Pre-Tweezer Eyebrows Back
Here's what brows have been up to the last 100 years:
