Earlier on this year, I wrote up a blog post on how to do your eyebrows, which contained a hefty tip of my hat to the current trend for thick, full brows, which I have been fighting with for some time due to many previous years of plucking them to within an inch of their lives.
However, it seems that shit is already moving on in the eyebrow stakes, and the latest, hottest “upcoming trend in eyebrows” (yes, I did wince when typing that) is eyebrow slits, or cutting little notches into your eyebrows, like this:
I have to say, I am really digging this look, although I am not quite ready to go there myself-Tumblr, on the other hand, is not so sure.
This look is one that has been sported for a couple of decades or more in the world of hip-hop, but is now being full-scale appropriated into mainstream makeup fashion as well.
As well as liking this look in and of itself, I really think that it is something that would look awesome with Goth styling, so if you’re a Goth who is already way ahead of me there, do send me a picture.
So anyway, in this blog post, I’m going to condense the advice of the wider internets and my beautician/stylist friend to give you some basic info on how to achieve this look, and share some pics of its various incarnations.
How to do it
Eyebrow slits are particularly getting a lot of love from me because both guys and gals are pulling off the look with equal aplomb, and I have literally not found a picture of anyone who has done it and it has not looked good; on the other hand, I can well imagine that there are plenty of gone-wrong attempts out there, that just never made it into the annals of internet cautionary tales.
The slits themselves are shaved into the eyebrow with a facial trimmer, and waxing, threading or plucking won’t work to get the defined edges that really set the look off.
If you have full eyebrows, you’re off to a head start here, as you have plenty to work with, and you’re sure to be able to get a more defined look with a lot of eyebrow to start with than if you have fine, light or thin brows.
How many lines you put in is up to you-one line seems popular, but so does three, or a whole-brow, graduated approach.
If I thought anyone would listen to me, the sum total of my advice on how to get your eyebrows to do this would be to go to a professional; either a hair salon that specialises in shaving shapes and designs into hair, or a beautician/eyebrow bar who really knows their stuff.
However, I am more than aware that the Goth collective as a whole are a motley bunch of DIY mavericks, and so I would suggest that you comb your eyebrows straight, use a dark pencil to colour your whole brow in, use a fine cotton bud to remove the liner in the spots you want, and then take to it-CAREFULLY-with a facial hair trimmer.
Another bonus is that you can use a liner or shader to fill your eyebrows back in over the slits if you don’t like it while it re-grows, or if slits would be considered a bit too edgy for work.
I also recommend watching this YouTube vid by Charlie Stripes, to actually see how it’s done in practice.
Alternatives to getting out the razor
If you really like the look but either aren’t confident enough to do it, don’t want to mess with your eyebrows, or want a look that will come off with your makeup, there are a couple of alternatives.
First of all, if you have light coloured eyebrows, you can follow the above steps ref. pencilling them in darker, and removing the colour from your “slits,” and see if this works out while letting your actual eyebrows do their own thing.
You could also use contrasting colour pencils to shade coloured lines into your brows, which is a great look in itself, if rather fiddly.
Finally, one last way to jazz up your eyebrows in a totally temporary way is to shape and define them with pencil, then use a coloured eyeliner liquid to place little dots along the inside of your lower brows.
