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April 30, 2021 — 16:41 PM
Any brow style that promises bold, fluffy brows without appearing too heavy has my attention. My set of arches are naturally sparse and blonde (no tweezer horror stories, I swear!), and they all but disappear in the sun. As such, I’m no stranger to a regular brow tint, as well as a trusty pencil to fill in the gaps—but it’s pretty difficult to nail that effortlessly lush look without teetering over to a heavily painted beat.
Fellow sparse-browed friends: You know the struggle. So allow me to introduce you to a style that’s easy for all of us to master: the geolift, coined by brow expert Joey Healy. He describes it as “the perfect marriage between the thinner brows of the ’90s and the dark, ‘Instagrammy’ boy brows of 2015,” and it’s versatile for all brow shapes and sizes.
How to style geolift brows.
Think of geolift brows as half-fluffy, half-structured. Follow the below for Healy’s styling guide.
The front of your brows (Healy calls them the “sprouts”) should be super feathery, bordering on unkempt. Grab a clear brow gel to direct the hairs upward: “I like to kind of run it through with the wand, and then use the tip of the mascara-like wand to separate them and make sure that they are really fringy,” he notes.
If you do have sparser areas you’d like to fill in, skip the pencil. An eyebrow powder is your best bet, here. See, a pillow-soft shadow (like Healy’s Luxe Brow Powder) helps the fronts appear feathery and natural.
“I don’t love the idea of mimicking individual hairs using a pen or a pencil; it just never looks that authentic. But by using a little bit of powder, you sort of close the gaps,” says Healy, adding, “I would just buff a little bit of color right behind the sprouts.” Use a clean spoolie to further blend.
While the fronts remain full and fluffy, geolift brows taper off at the tails. Use that clear brow gel and sculpt the ends downward to create a sharper angle. “Sometimes I even use a tweezer to kind of ‘clamp’ it shut by pinching the tail together while it’s still wet with clear brow gel.”
Take note: He’s not plucking out any hairs, here, but using the tool to grab the tails and fuse the delicate wisps together—you can also do this with your fingers, but tweezers may be easier to grab hold with.
If your tails aren’t cooperating, Healy recommends sweeping two coats of brow gel: Wait for the first coat to dry before applying the next and finessing the shape.
While everyone’s natural peak rests at a different place (see here for how to find yours), you’ll want to define that high point with a dab of highlighter. “Not above the brow, not under the whole brow, but right under the arch,” says Healy. “That little bit of cream highlighter gives a total lift, which is really flattering for the entire eye area.”
Brow shapes run the gamut, and it’s typically best practice to work with what you naturally have, be it round, straight, peaked, or upward. However, certain styling tricks can mold your arches into the best they can be, like the geolift.
