If there’s one thing that I have secretly admired about supermodel Cara Delevingne, it’s her eyebrows; their epic Arc de Triomphe–like proportions make the tufty lop-sided lines of hair that frame my face look about as monumental as a bus stop. She isn’t the first woman to have stoked my brow envy: I remember wishing my face would sprout some version of Brooke Shields’s feathered arches as a teenager (instead, Mother Nature blessed me with a snaggletooth) and my attempts to re-create the statement brows of legendary sixties model Donyale Luna in my twenties with Indian kohl only ended in disaster (think Groucho Marx, minus the mustache).
For now, though, it’s Cara’s brows that leave me wanting. And it seems I’m not the only one. “Ninety-nine point nine percent of women come in asking for them,” says Umbreen Sheikh, whose beauty salon, Wink, is one of the few places in New York offering Delevingne-esque eyebrow extensions. Much like lash extensions, the painstaking process involves applying tiny fibers to the area one hair at a time.
“I would set aside at least an hour and a half, but it can take up to two,” says Sheikh taking a quick survey of my face before we get started. First-timers like me will pay $350 initially—a considerable investment—with touch-ups every two or three weeks thereafter, but that hasn’t stopped any of her clients from coming back again and again. “Getting fuller, more youthful-looking brows is a real confidence booster, especially for women who might have experienced hair loss due to chemotherapy or alopecia,” she says. “It’s hard to put a value on that.”
To prep the area for extensions, stray hairs are tweezed away and then a dark tint is applied to the existing eyebrows, “because a darker, more shapely brow will already look fuller,” she says. Once the dye has taken, synthetic fibers are applied to my skin with a nontoxic glue as I lie back. Fifty minutes later, and I’m so relaxed, I’m almost asleep. “Take a look, they’re finished!” says Sheikh as I peek into the mirror. “Just remember not to wet your face in the next 24 hours, avoid oil-based cleansers, and you’re good to go.”
Adjusting my eye to my reflection takes longer than I anticipate; somehow these new and improved brows put a different frame on my face entirely; the waist-length braids I’ve been wearing for the last three months, for example, appear OTT. I rush home to undo my plaits and settle on a tightly pulled-back bun with center part for the evening which make my eyebrows—and my cheekbones!—pop. Worn with giant hoop earrings and deep red lipstick and the look is a good cross between Sade and Madonna, circa 1995. I throw on a ruffled off-the-shoulder top for dramatic effect. “You look great tonight. Did you get a facial?” asks one friend at dinner as I nod affirmatively, smiling to myself so as not to give the game away. A few hours and a couple of glasses of wine later, and I let her in on the secret. “But they look so natural!” she says. “I would have never had guessed.”
Fast-forward two weeks and the synthetic hair fibers have almost all but fallen away. At the suggestion of a beauty editor friend, I book an appointment with makeup artist and brow whisperer Maribeth Madron, who has the kind of dreamy natural-looking brows that I would give my left arm for—not to mention glowing porcelain skin. If anyone can teach me a few do-it-yourself tricks, surely it’s her. “You’re not stuck with what you have. Mine didn’t always look like this,” she says reassuringly. “The goal is to have the best eyebrow possible for you.”
Once Madron helps me figure out the right arch placement for my face shape (not everyone can pull off a thick, straight brow like Cara—my arch should align with the outer corner of my pupils, for example), the next and most crucial step is to fill in the gaps. “Sketch with little brush strokes toward the growth of the hair using a pencil where the hair is at its most sparse first,” she says holding up a mirror to my face. “Then add color and weight with powder in the middle so most of it’s off the brush when you get to the trickier parts, like the end of the brow, which is known as the tail.” After experimenting with a few brow duo sets and putty, I get to work with Maybelline’s Define and Fill brow combo—it comes with a mechanical pencil on one end and powder on the other, which makes for less fuss for a makeup sloth like me. She suggests a few coats of clear eyebrow gel to finish the look “since anytime you brush up your brows, they look thicker,” she explains. “It tames the unruly strands, and gives a 3-D effect.”
Catching a glimpse at my newly made-up eye-catching brows, and I can barely believe that I did them myself (well, almost). After years of over-plucking, I only wish I could undo the brow sins of the past and start over. “Well, there are ways,” says Madron. “But first you have to go cold turkey and stop doing anything to your brows altogether.” Applying a stimulant nightly like RevitaBrow to encourage regrowth helps things along, according to her, and will usually show results in about three weeks. And when you’re finally ready to start shaping again, Madron insists on sticking to these golden rules: 1) “No threading or waxing,” 2) “Never tweeze before bedtime, or when you’re PMS-ing. You’ll hack at them when you’re stressed or tired,” and 3) “Only ever pluck stray hairs when your eyebrows are fully made-up or filled-in. Removing a few strands in the wrong direction will make for a major set back.” In other words, the best place for me to keep my tweezers in the next few weeks is in a glass of water in the freezer.
The post Can You Have Brows Like Cara Delevingne? One Editor’s Ultimate Beauty Quest appeared first on Vogue.
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