For the past 5 or so years, I've wasted so much time simply through having to draw my eyebrows on from scratch. Suffering from hair loss, having no natural shape to guide you makes drawing on those caterpillars (and getting them even) incredibly time-consuming and frustrating. I've always wished for a way to make it that little bit easier and faster, so when I saw these eyebrow stencils from budget brand W7, I thought this may be the answer to my prayers. In theory, this is a hair loss sufferer's dream product, but when put to the test, are these stencils more of a hindrance than a help?
Within this Brow Bar kit (found in the murky realms of the TK Maxx beauty section), W7 provide you with a brow palette containing 3 different shades and a highlighter, a powder brush, a comb/spoolie thing and 3 stencils. The stencils vary in width, allowing you to choose how bold you want your brow look to be. While the brushes' cheap price correlates with their quality (ie. they're crap), the powders are actually pretty decent. They're quite well pigmented, and the range of shades mean it's easy to mix and blend to find the perfect combination to suit your skin tone and hair colour. It also allows you to create a bit of depth- if you're drawing them on from scratch, you don't want your brows to seem like one block of colour, so adding some darker tones here and there can make your brows look far more natural.
The stencils themselves come in a translucent plastic set which are placed over your brows (or where they are supposed to be). Each stencil is actually broken into two parts; a bit of plastic separates the main part of the brow from the tail, meaning you can rotate the stencil to tailor the angle of your arch to your liking. If you're using the powders provided by the brow kit, dab your selected shade(s) in the stencils. I would actually not recommend using the powders from this kit (or any) with the stencils. From using this once, I think they would be far easier to use with a brow pencil as it allows you to control the shape and depth with more precision; using powder with the stencils can get a bit too messy and inaccurate.
When used with a pencil, these stencils can actually be quite helpful for a rough guide (emphasis on rough). You can use them to help draw little markers of where your brows should start and end, or aid in getting these basic composites even. However, when used as a complete stencil, these look so unnatural and will not give you the results you want or need. As you can tell from my attempt, my brows look ridiculous. Everyone's brow shape is different, and using a stencil will eliminate this natural attempt at shape. They are such a faff when trying to keep in place on your face, and I would only be willing to put up with this is the results were good. My advice? Ditch the stencils, study the natural shape of your brow bone and stick to free-styling it. Stencils will only leave you with fake-looking caterpillars on your face. Kudos for the relatively good brow palette though, W7!
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Have you tried brow stencils? What tricks do you use when drawing on eyebrows?
I have some brow stencils because when I started out doing my brows, I thought they'd help me get a better shape. I soon discovered that I found them more difficult to use than just a pencil on its own. I found them really hard to keep in place/ position correctly and it looked really unnatural, Come to think of it, I should probably bin them! Em x
ReplyDeletehttp://themusingsofem.blogspot.co.uk/
They do seem like they are more hassle than they're worth x
DeleteI think they are handy for getting a line but not the whole thing as sometimes my eyebrows have come out horrifically after and wanted to cry haha xx
ReplyDeleteYep same! Life is easier without them! Xxx
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