springmachinery

[springmachinery]

The super detailed eyebrow guide Part 1

Hello everyone, this will be my first post on this blog. Let’s cut to the chase, the first thing we will be talking about is eyebrow styling. There is no one “ideal” eyebrow shape that suits everyone and likely you suit a couple of eyebrow styles yourself. There is no absolute “wrong” answer when it comes to eyebrows, it greatly depends on what kind of vibe you desire to give off: cute, professional, sexy, mature, innocent, anything goes. These will just be some tips that might help you to figure out what works for you, just remember that it is very difficult to make an absolutely accurate guess without seeing your full face, this is ideally a self-help resource.

First of all, you will often see the basic styling guide that goes something like this:

However, I found that this wasn’t absolutely helpful to me. What about thickness? The height of the brow? How arched should I go? Some girls look amazing with perfectly straight brows, right? Is this the only arch that looks good? It’s hard to find info on all of this so let me start:

The thickness of the brows

Think of it this way: The eyebrows are supposed to accentuate what is already there or balance it, as such it is important to follow the lines of the face to create appropriate harmony. Faces are complicated and you may even suit a different type of eyebrows when you have more weight on you, I know I do. Along with that, when it comes to eyebrows, the eyes are the most important determinant, but not the ONLY determinant. Some faces need more softness/sharpness so you add the appropriate eyebrows, at other times, you want to play exactly into the type of features that you have. 

Would you say your facial features are more elongated, narrow and have a certain lightness? None of your features stand out, rather they all work together, no facial feature is too large. Then go for a thinner brow. Think of celebrities like Taylor Swift 

Or Charlize Theron

Heather Morris 

Hyuna ( kpop idols rarely rock completely thin eyebrows, but you can see that among them she has a thinner variant)  

Another point to present is the “chubbiness” vs “dryness” of your face. The more “dry” your face is, meaning the less facial fat and roundness you have, the more likely thin brows suit you. Let’s look at Halle Berry - the thinner her face became, the more she suited thin brows. 

And the midpoint:

One thing to notice is that her eyebrows were never TOO thick - her balanced features would simply never allow for it. Look at someone like Charlize with thick eyebrows, it just didn’t suit her. Her features are simply too delicate for that.

Are your features larger, heavier, more "in your face" - especially the eyes? Consider a much thicker brow like the following ladies. The brows need to follow the lines of your face, if your eyes are very “strong”, they deserve an appropriate assistant! Lucy Hale

Sofia Vergara

Sofia Loren

Lilly Collins

Aisha

Look how much better Beyonce looks with thicker brows, these eyebrows are not that thin to begin with, now imagine how much less flattering thinner eyebrows would be for her face:

The same can be said about Lykke Li, her face is much more balanced when she sports thicker brows due to her beautiful heavy features. 

Notice that many of these women have either rounder or wide cheeks, even if their faces may not hold onto more flesh, that’s the bone structure. That is a trait that suits thicker brows, on the other hand, the ladies in the “thin eyebrows” category often have slightly narrower lines and sharper bones. The thin eyebrows soften them up. 

However, there are some exceptions to this. If all of your features a very large or maybe even your forehead is smaller than you’d prefer, you may go the complete opposite route and take thin brows.

A youtube Anncy is a beautiful example of someone who made the right call going for thin brows instead of thick ones. Larger brows would wear down her face and perhaps take more space away from the rest of her features. When you have large features, sometimes it is difficult to juggle proportions: adding large eyebrows can take away either from eyebrow height or forehead length so if you recognize yourself in this, consider going for thinner brows even though your features are large. The only image of thick brows on her I could find offhand is this  but I felt it would be unfair to put them with the other ones, as I feel the lightning and angle isn’t equal or as flattering, but hopefully you get the point. 

Another example of this is Angelina Jolie. She goes for much thinner eyebrows than you’d expect from someone with features as large as those. 

Big eyebrows would simply be too much competition for the rest of her face:

However, many people don’t fit any type perfectly and that’s also perfectly fine. Most are in the hybrid category, so they have to pay attention to various features.

Kerry Washington is one such example. Her features are larger, yet her eyes are very delicate. Her face is narrow, but there is much fleshiness to it. She goes for a brow that isn’t too thick or too thin. They’re narrow to follow the longer line of the face, yet not too thin to harmonize with the roundness of her features, cheeks and chin. 

Megan Fox has fairly small features and yet she looks better with thicker brows? Why? Because her face possesses a certain sharpness, particularly in her features, that needs thick eyebrows to balance them out. This also has to do with her coloring and contrast, but that will be its own category in a following post. 

Also, while it may seem like blondes suit thinner brows and brunettes thicker ones, that may not exactly be it. I put the example of Lykke Li who shows that a blonde can perfectly rock thick eyebrows, and Hyuna and Halle, as an example that brunettes can also look beautiful with thin ones. I’ll go more in depth about this in the Coloring section. 

Arched vs Straight eyebrows

The arch of the brow depends on your overall features and the style you want to convey. A longer midface may suit straighter, longer eyebrows to add width to the face. Straight eyebrows also make you look younger and more cute. They can also help the forehead look wider. An example of this is Yoona, this girl has a longer midface and the brows add a vertical line that breaks apart the length of the midface. The straight brows also suit her cute and youthful appeal.

Mina from Twice is another good example of this. The straight brows add balance to the length of the face.

I would suggest straighter brows to people who’d prefer a cuter look usually, however many sexpots, so to speak, go for this look to balance out their features. Look how much width these straight brows, that extend far out, allow Jessica Alba’s longer face.

Straight eyebrows, depending on how dark they are, can also add drama and make the face seem more symmetrical and lifted, especially if the ends of the brows point up - that’s why they’re popular with models. Notice how symmetrical and compact, or even wide, a lot of these faces appear due to this effect. Additionally, these faces appear more dominant or modelesque and may even photograph better, which is why you may want to try them out. 

Let’s look at Nyane, her straight brows with a slight elevation towards the end point out the beautiful symmetry and sharpness of her face. When they are arched, there is too much sharpness. Even if they were shaped differently, the elevated arch would take away from a more balanced look.  

On the other hand, for the e-girl or cute girl look, the straight eyebrows don’t point up, rather, they point down. Look at the classic e-girl Belle Delphine for that. For the cute girl look, choose either an end that points neutrally or down. Beware that an eyebrow that point down may make your face appear less lifted, but many faces can handle it pretty well. It’s all subjective and not everyone wants the lifted look.

As for arched brows, they definitely bring up the sex appeal and make your eyes appear lifted. This is great if you want to go for enhanced sex appeal or have a negative canthal tilt (downturned eyes) that you’d like to change. Arched eyebrows are a classic and they add that “wow” factor to the face, in addition to that, it’s also a great choice for those who have a baby face and want to stray away from that. It’s great to add that arched eyebrows can break up a wide face and add “length”, it can also shrink the forehead and make the eyes appear larger, but that will be further covered in the placement section.

Gigi Hadid has beautiful eyebrows that make her eyes appear huge due to the high arch point. The eyebrows are her best feature and certainly add something to her look. Pay attention to how babylike her face would look without those eyebrows, if you’d cover them, her face would seem so much softer. The arched brows are exactly what make her face model like. It’s that extra something.

Aishwarya Rai is famous for her sex appeal and beauty and her eyebrows play up that aspect - she often lifts up one or both brows in photos to get an even more pronounced arch.

When her eyebrows are straighter, she loses some of that seductiveness.

Anne Hathaway has beautiful downturned eyes, however, in case one would like to “lift” the area up, so to speak, they could try out this type of style. The arch of the brow is exactly above where her eye ends and goes down, making for beautiful harmony.

Eyebrows can also be more sharply arched or have a more rounded arch. A sharper arch can add more dimension to the face, as well as sex appeal, while the rounded one can accentuate femininity (look Gigi and A,R, or someone like Sofia Vergara). Marylin Monroe, in tune with old Hollywood beauties, sported a sharper arch often, as did Olivia Wilde, to suit her sharp features.  

Naomi, is also an example of beautiful arched eyebrows, that mix up both the rounded and sharp aspect by going to no extreme. This can suit you really well if you have a mix of sharp and round features like she does (high cheekbones, elongated face + full lips, rounded cheeks etc.)

If you can’t decide which eyebrow to go for, consider the mix of the two: where the eyebrows bottom line is more straight and the top of it is arched. It is often seen on women with cat eyes that want to add softness but also show off that allure. Notice how the bottom of Barbara’s eyebrow here is straight and the top is arched - this is also great if you have difficulty with shaping your brows as it is forgiving for filling in + it looks very natural.

All of this said, it is up to you if you want to add sharpness or softness to your face - there is no right call and a lot of it has to do with what your style and taste is. Many of these women have tried out all types of arches and found that each look “sold” something, a particular essence. It is up to you to choose what you like, however, I hope this guide helped you in discovering which eyebrows suit what style. 

I wish to also address more finely tuned details of the eyebrow such as:

-Eyebrow placement (Low and High placed)

-The placement of the arch and its effects on the look you are portraying

-Having eyebrows compliment individual features (close set eyes, wide set eyes, broad noses etc)

-Coloring of the eyebrows

and perhaps some more. Stay tuned!