If you’re a Goth who does not like makeup, this blog post is not going to have any interest for you. I am a large-scale makeup fanatic, and am always on the lookout for new looks and new ideas, but for this blog post, I am going to go back to one of the most basic but often overlooked aspects of doing your face: Eyebrows. Even the most unobservant of Goths cannot fail to have noticed that eyebrows seem to have become a big thing recently, and big, bold brows are the current look of choice across pretty much every genre, including Goth.
Good eyebrows are particularly important for Goths working strong makeup, as they frame your face and add balance to a look that might otherwise be rather bottom heavy, particularly if you don’t have a fringe. So without further ado, here are some of my top tips on doing your eyebrows for various different looks and styles.
Grooming
Most of us tidy up our eyebrows to some extent, even if this only means plucking out the odd runaway hair that grows in the odd place. Don’t over-pluck your eyebrows, or you’ll be leaving yourself nothing to work with- you can always take more off, but you can’t put back eyebrows that you’ve removed so easily! This blog rocks natural eyebrows, along with some tips and tricks.
Highlighting
If your hair is dark and your face is pale, you’ll probably need to pay some attention to your brows to make sure that they’re actually visible and not practically disappearing. Invest in a soft brow pencil and brush to fill in any gaps, and shape your brows into the form that you prefer. Your brows should never be lighter than your hair, but they need not be black either; pencils can be had in all shades of brown, some tawny shades, and red tints for redheads too, for a defined but not over the top look, if that’s what you’re aiming for.
Colours
Having bright or unnaturally coloured hair makes a big statement, but it can also make it hard to know what to do about your eyebrows. If your eyebrows are too light or faint, it will let down the look of your hair, but what colour to do your brows when your hair is no shade organically found in nature? You have a variety of options. If your brows are naturally a reasonable colour and well defined, you don’t really have to do anything much to them, but if not, consider pencilling them in a little in the natural colour of your hair, or a shade or two darker.
Something I like pairing with my neon pink hair is natural brown brows, with three small dots of pink following the tips of the brows along the side of my eyes. You can, of course, pencil in or highlight your entire brow in the same colour as your hair.
Shaping
Shaping your brows is one of the hardest things to get right, and one of the worst to try to correct if you get it wrong! I have largely given up the ghost on this one, and pay £6 every month or so to get my eyebrows threaded and shaped by someone who really knows what they are doing. Prior to this, I have managed to wax off virtually all of one of my brows on one occasion, as well as having plucked them so badly that they ended up looking as if at least one of them was not a native resident of my face.
If you want to have a go yourself, by all means knock yourself out; but have a plan! Sophistique Noir has a whole blog post dedicated to this, and the YouTube video below shows you more in simple steps.
