Beauty on a Budget

Image via www.mybeautybox.ca
Image via www.mybeautybox.ca

Annabelle Eyebrow Pencil

By Lauren Kelly, Assistant Editor

In the last few years, full and “perfect” eyebrows have become the popular style. For many people who have sparse, thin, or patchy eyebrows, however, this look requires brow makeup and brushes to get right. Even those with full brows often use eyebrow makeup to clean them up and perfect them.

As far as mid-end products go, Anastasia Beverly Hill’s eyebrow products, particularly its Dipbrow Pomade Gel and Brow Wiz pencils, have leading the pack in popularity. These cost $23 and $27 respectively, and those who need to use a lot of product each day could use them up fairly quickly, making them a potential money-sink.

A good alternative to Brow Wiz is Annabelle’s Eyebrow Pencils. Like the Brow Wiz, each comes with the product and a built-in brush, in this case as part of the cap. Although it’s not a spoolie and instead a straight brush, it works very well to blend out the product and groom the brows.

The product itself is waxy and long-lasting for most people. When it’s sharp, it works well to define the outside of the eyebrows and draw in hairs, and as it gets duller it still works well for filling in your brows, meaning you don’t have to worry about constantly keeping it sharpened and wasting product.

It is available in Taupe, Blonde, Auburn, Medium Brown, and Black. I purchased Medium Brown, but although I am very happy with the product’s quality, I find the colour is a little too warm for my very cool-toned eyebrows. However, many reviewers of the product, as well as my mother, who recommended the product to me, found that the Taupe matched their light eyebrows very closely. This is because it is an ash blonde, instead of an orange one, and it has the added bonus of being a close dupe of Brow Wiz in Taupe.

The black is a great inclusion as well for people of colour, although I know that some prefer a dark grey. This may be helped by using a light hand with the product. It is also nice to see a colour for people with red hair in the Auburn colour, as I had difficulty finding a similar product when I had red hair a few years ago.

Overall, I am very happy with this product. Although I do tend towards my Dipbrow due to the closer colour match, this is a great alternative when I have less time, or less room as I don’t have to carry a pot and brushes with this. You can purchase it at London Drugs for $6.99, or Shoppers Drug Mart for $7.99.