Eyebrow Queen Allison Browning chats brow shaping with Beautyholics Anonymous.

What makes a great eyebrow?
Well, for me, it’s about working with a client’s natural shape and what’s going to suit their face. Some therapists feel the need to do too much to the brow and take too much off. I suspect they feel that if they don’t take a lot of hair away then they haven’t done their job.

The trick is to craft a brow that works with what that brow wants to do! It doesn’t matter if you like a subtle or more accentuated arch or what your taste it’s about working with what you have and embracing it! A basic brow can really look both natural and amazing with just a little expert assistance.

What are things that we shouldn’t do when maintaining our brows?
It’s easy to get a little overexcited in between your brow visits and tweeze away too much. You can end up losing the beautiful shape. I tend to let clients know that if they do feel the need to tweeze it’s best to only tweeze away the bothersome obvious hairs and don’t go too far up into the actual brow shape that we’ve created.

The other mistake a lot of people make is to tweeze too much from the centre of the brow. It makes the brows end up looks very far apart. My motto is less is more when maintaining your brows at home between your appointments.

How should we deal with grey hairs?
Grey hairs are a bit annoying, yes. The temptation for many is to tweeze them out and fast! The problem is that if you tweeze them, you end up leaving bald spots in the end. When dealing with greys a good brow tint is important. Getting your brows tinted is a simple procedure and when an expert does them for you, they’ll look natural and your greys will be covered!

What about over-tweezed eyebrows, what can be done with those?
Trickery is my answer to that one! It is phenomenal what you can do with over-tweezed brows with a great tint and shape. The way I deal with tint is a little unique. I mix a lot of colours and I work on specific zones of the brow to ‘fill it in’. The result is pretty awesome when it’s done properly.

You’ll also find there’s some brow stimulating products out there that you can be using between visits to see if you can stimulate the hair follicle again to produce more hair where the brow has been over-tweezed. Just make sure you select a reputable brand.

How did you end up specialising in eyebrows?
You could say it was an accident really. I have always been a little fanatical about my own brows. They’re full and I was always fussy about them and I suppose clients notice that and when they see a full well shaped brow it brings a bit of trust, it’s a visual that you’re capable of doing a good job. Brows are so visible and people talk so I suppose my reputation grew from word of mouth, it’s a lovely thing!

The images below are taken on my second visit to Allison’s salon to get my brows fixed. As you could tell from the recent FOTD post, my eyebrows were looking very unsightly as I was waiting for them to grow out. The pictures were taken with Allison’s camera. The only editing done was to add round corners and a processed Instagram-ish filter to the images. No other photo editing was carried out, hence the extreme close-up of yucky lines, blemishes and puffiness below the eyes. Just look at the brows, won’t ya?

Before:

After:

In the after shots, it seems as though my brows are very thin at the end. I reckon that’s just the angle of the camera when the pictures were taken. In real life, my brows, especially the ends, are quite thick and shaped very well.

At that point, I haven’t actually seen my eyebrows in the mirror yet, only the photos she took right after she was done with my brows. I exclaimed quite loudly and in a most unladylike fashion, “holy crap my brows! They’re gorgeous!”. I may have also drooled a little. I kid you not 😛

Allison takes appointments from her Melbourne-based practice. For bookings, please call her at 0413 559 177