The idea behind the classic shape for eyebrows is to frame your eyes with grace and symmetry. They draw attention to your eyes and make them sparkle without being over-bearing. So, if you’re not sure what to do with those caterpillars on your forehead, if you’ve been over-tweezed, or if you want to make a small style change, then follow these helpful tips.

Beauty finds itself entwined with the science of symmetrical geometry … but the math is pretty simple, so don’t worry. Obviously, one thing you want to have for great looking eyebrows is two that are shaped the same. The best place to start is with eyebrows that haven’t been tweezed. If you’ve over-tweezed, then you might not have much to work with and might want to let them grow out a bit so that you have more to work with in reshaping your classic brows.

Tweezing Tips

First, there are some basic things about tweezing your eyebrows that you should know:

• Sterilize your tweezers with peroxide or at least wash them well with antibacterial soap. It’s a good idea to sterilize your brow brush as well.
• Wash your eye area gently but thoroughly. Do not put cream or anything around the area as it could cause infection. If your eye area begins to swell while tweezing then stop immediately
• Brush your brows straight up so you can find the bottom line. You want to tweeze below the main brow line, not above it
• Tweeze one hair at a time
• Always start at the beginning of the brow and tweeze outward. Tweeze in rows and alternate brows as you go; tweeze one row from the right brow, then one from the left. Brush them constantly so you can see how you’re doing
• Grab the hair as close to the base as possible. This is where it is thickest and less likely to break. Tweeze in the direction the hair grows with one fast, smooth motion
• Don’t get carried away. you want to be conservative with how much you tweeze.
• Chickens are plucked - eyebrows are tweezed!

Shaping the Classic Brow

You can see in the picture a number of guidelines. You don’t have to draw these lines on your face to figure this out. Just use your brow brush as a straight ruler to roughly see where you need to do some shaping. There are some tricks to shaping eyebrows if you have close-set eyes, wide-set eyes, a tall forehead, or whatever - that’s for another article. Right now, let’s just concentrate on creating the basic classic brow.

Here are the basics, and there are 4 key things to know:

1. The brow starts (line D) a little bit in towards the center of your face from the corner of your eye. It ends at line F, which is roughly a 45 degree angle that starts at the brow beginning and runs alongside the outside edge of your eye. Use your brush to estimate this.
2. The bottom of the brow (line B) is at the same height as the top of your eyelid. Both ends of the brow should be at roughly the same height, with the tail end perhaps a little higher.
3. Your eyebrow’s arch (line E) should be in line with the outside of your iris (the colored part of your eye) when you’re looking straight ahead.
4. Your brow height (line B to line C) should be about the same height as from the top of your eyelid to the bottom half of your iris (line A to line B). Another way to look at this is while looking straight ahead with your eyes open normally, the height of your eyelid should be about half the height of your eyebrow.

That’s it! Follow the basic rules for shaping a classic brow and, whether you’re 4-wheeling in the bush or strolling along the red carpet, you’ll be wearing a little bit of that timeless head-turning look at all times.

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