In the beauty world, there are few higher compliments one can be paid than “You have great eyebrows.” Brows are a complicated sector of self-care—the last vestige of untouched, truly effortless aesthetics, where the right mix of genetics and cosmetic restraint allows you to show off your gifts. All sorts of guys known for their charm, smolder, or sex appeal boast a great pair of big, beautiful brows—from Drake to Dan Levy, Chris Pine to Henry Cavill, Joe Jonas to Henry Golding. A proud, big pair of brows can seem like the facial equivalent of Big Dick Energy: You either got it, or you don’t.
Except there’s plenty you can do. That’s why Bob Scott, a celebrity makeup artist and brow expert in New York City, has made brows their business. An appointment with Scott will run you $175—a significant chunk of cash, considering each client goes on a “journey” with them that involves an initial consultation, plus a Scott-imposed “no tweeze rule” that could span anywhere from six weeks to six months.
Their method, they insist, is less about artistry than biology. “Once you remove a hair, that follicle needs to regenerate itself, which takes up to six weeks,” Scott explains, “So if you tweeze more frequently than that, you’re never actually tweezing the same hairs, which can lead to an inconsistent brow shape, muddying the vision for what your brow should actually look like.”
Scott’s disciples (for this is a religious experience, in case you haven’t gathered) often lament their “grow-out phase,” wherein they’ve stowed away their tweezers in the hopes that a more even and symmetrical pair of brows will eventually be revealed. But, as I can faithfully attest (Scott has been doing my brows for over five years), once they work their magic, it’s the most addictive $175 you’ll ever spend. After an appointment, your friends or your partner will look at you and wonder “what you’ve done”—because you look refreshed, better, younger, even—but they just can’t pinpoint the difference. That’s precisely the genius of it all: Scott’s work somehow looks like they were never there.
This is all the more remarkable considering Scott’s service generally consists first of tinting your eyebrows (applying a semi-permanent dye), trimming the hair if necessary, then a shaping process. All in all, their work could take anywhere from 30 to 90 minutes, depending on what kind of intervention is necessary.
All of this preciousness about their art form underscores a simple fact: Bob Scott is not just in the business of eyebrows. Just like everything—perhaps more than anything—else on our faces, eyebrows communicate something about us. “They are the frames,” Scott says. “They add structure. They accentuate certain features, either by softening or strengthening. They can enhance your brow bone. They can make your eyes look more open, making you look more alert, or your eye color pop. They can also make you appear more youthful—an indicator of the biological youth we’re all trying to keep.”
If that all sounds like a lot for your little eyebrows to carry, it is! But a quick Google search of “celebrities without eyebrows” will show you just how powerful those two rows of hair on your face really are. (Reader, you’ve been warned: It’s bizarre.) Luckily, Scott says, guys generally have an advantage in this arena: The hair on our faces doesn’t thin as much as we age, and broadly speaking, we grow a bushier or thicker brow than many women. It’s what we do with this playing field advantage that matters.
Conventional wisdom might tell you to get your eyebrows waxed or threaded as a part of routine maintenance, but Scott balks at the concept. “If you thread, people will be able to tell you got your eyebrows done, because it leaves very crisp and defined lines.” Waxing, they say, is “a definite no-no. It damages the skin and is very imprecise. if something goes wrong, it can take a long time to reverse that error.” (Or worse! A waxing mistake may actually never grow back—brow hair can be curiously temperamental.)
Instead, Scott relies on a more traditional method: Tweezing. It takes longer, but using tweezers allows you to deftly go hair by hair, carefully choosing what to remove, and allowing you to assess your face before going further. It also does the least damage to your skin, and is the least perceptible to the naked eye. “You can do the bare minimum you need to make a pronounced difference—just enough that nobody will be able to really see that you’ve done your eyebrows,” they say.
If you don’t trust yourself to do a good job with your tweezers, Scott says that most aestheticians who wax or thread will accommodate you anyway. The key here, of course, is that these folks are used to creating uniformity and an ultra-clean finished process, so you have to guide them in the right direction. Scott suggests asking for a mirror to hold to survey their work, or telling them what you like about your brows versus what areas you think need attention.
As a general rule of thumb for DIY jobs or a spa appointment, Scott insists that there are two areas that must remain as natural-looking as possible: the center (conventionally known as the unibrow), and the “tails” (or the ends of our brows).
“When I see a guy who’s over-tweezed, it’s usually because he removed so many hairs on the ends that were spaced out and feathered naturally, which he thought looked like gaps,” Scott says. The natural progression of your brow should be a slow fade—truncating them can make you lose a lot of God-given structure that frames your eyes. (Leave them alone or remove very sparingly!)
The unibrow, however, can be a pitfall in a different way. Once you start plucking hairs that clearly exist in the middle gap, you might be tempted to start taking a hair here and there from the beginning of your brows. Before you know it, you have completely changed your face...and made yourself look a little strange in the process. A good rule of thumb is to step back from the mirror after removing every three hairs. Blink twice, assess your work, then decide if you want to continue. The worst mistakes are made with your face pressed up against the glass, or when you’re using a magnifying mirror. For ease with the process, nab a pair of Tweezerman Slant Tweezers ($23).
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As for underneath your brows? Some gems are best left uncut, my friends, and these are best left untouched. “Leave it alone!” Scott says. “What it’s doing already is probably what is also the most complimentary for your face—plus, changing it means you also have to do the exact same thing on the other side, which takes a high level of skill.”
Beyond that, a quick trim of your brows may be necessary, especially if you grow longer or bushier hairs. But, “Do not let your barber do this for you with a pair of clippers,” Scott advises, since the uniformity can look unnatural. A (clean!) toothbrush and a normal pair of scissors will work fine, but try Tweezerman Brow Shaping Scissors and Brush ($19) for some extra precision. Push up all of the hair, then carefully trim any of the longer or rogue hairs at a downwards angle.
But the holy grail of Scott’s service isn’t just the tweezing or the shaping. What makes the biggest difference—even for their male clients—is an application of semipermanent dye.
“Tinting makes a huge difference for me because it allows me to maximize the brow hairs. It makes every hair equally dark and present. While some hairs are naturally finer or lighter, a tint will make everything more defined and appear more dense,” Scott says. Even naturally full-browed clients will benefit from tinting, since it fills in tiny gaps and strengthens your overall shape. If you’re going gray or you feel your hair thinning, tinting will have the most impact: “You will look younger, and your hair will be fuller and have its color. It’s an easy way to give yourself a little perk without Botox or a dermatologist appointment.”
Brow tinting can sometimes be hard to find as a professional service—but don’t mistake it for newer offerings like eyebrow tattooing or microblading, which are more severe solutions for brows that have entirely depleted and need a permanent fix. Services like these focus on adding color to your skin, whereas brow tinting just focuses on your hair. And, if you’re really nervous about it and want to keep things in your own hands, Scott recommends using Just for Men Mustache and Beard Hair Color ($9).
As always, grooming has to be about maximizing the smallest details in order to make the greatest impact. And if you’ve ever visited a barber who gave you a beard trim or a line-up that totally changed your confidence, you’d be amazed at what a simple tint and tweeze can do for your brows.
“Facial hair can raise your cheekbones, hide a flabby chin, or define a jawline,” Scott says. “If you’re already invested in those kinds of upgrades to your routine, it shouldn’t be hard for you to understand why the eyebrows are your next logical step.”
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