Splurge Vs. Steal: Fix those brows

Ok, so your brows have a great shape but in pictures they look a little non-existent. You probably need a product to fill in your brows without overdoing it as you wouldn't want to wind up with the brows of Mr. Groucho Marx or Mr. Leonid Brezhnev.


A great product to fill in brows is powder as it usualy looks more natural than pencil (people usualy use a heavy hand with pencil resulting in dark and obviously-drawn on brows) . A few light strokes in a brow powder with a soft angled brush is all you need. To hold them in place, a little wax is all you need although you can also use brow gel or sometimes clear mascara wand to brush my brows up and out towards the temples.

For this addition of Splurge vs. Steal, I show two great products which contain both wax for sculpting the brows and brow powder for filling them in.

Smashbox: This product is easy to work with and gives brows a natural filled-in look. Apply with an angled brush or a brow brush of your choice. I like MAC's 263 for the brows or for applying cream eyeliners or for applying eyeshadow as eyeliner. It comes in these six shades: Auburn, Blonde, Gray, Taupe, Soft Brown and Brunette. With such a great variety, you are more than likely to find one that matches you. It lasts a long time so there are minimal touch-ups required.

Cons: High Price and I would rather have a flip-top lid.

Price: US$ 24. While pricey, you need to remember that a little goes a long way. The variety of shades is much better than NYC's.

My rating: 9/10

New York Color (N.Y.C.): Here is a great drugstore product which is comparable to its' highend counterpart. The kit comes with a stiff brush and some tweezers. The little tweezers are not bad in a pinch but I would recommend more professional brows when tweezing at home. I keep tweezers in my purse and in my car for emergencies. The brush is not bad. It is a little thick but some people prefer this to a thin angled brush so it is all up to personal preference.

Cons: This only comes in two colours: brunette and blonde so if you have red/auburn hair etc. this might not work for you. I have read reviews that the brunette and blonde are able to match a variety of shades.

Price: $US 3.99. Remember, this is for wax, brow powder, tweezers and a brush so it is a pretty good deal!

My rating: 8/10 (one point off for cheesy packaging and one point off for lack of shades to choose from).