10 Celebs Whose Eyebrows We Thought Were Real, But Are Actually Fake (And 10 That Are Surprisingly Real)
Eyebrows are so in right now, actually, they always have been and will always be a huge part of beauty. But brow shaping and grooming have taken center stage when it comes to maintenance. And some people need a little extra help in the brow department, whether it's a major movie star or a celeb mom who doesn't have the time for a full face of glam and some don't. Celebrities are enlisting the help of semi-permanent makeup artists to take their routine from basic to bold, while others just need a pair of tweezers and a little brow pomade.
But in the world of celebrity, some need to take their beauty routines to the next level---enter eyebrow tattooing, which encompasses the newer trend of microblading and its spin-off, microfeathering which gives the eyebrow a very natural look. There is also eyebrow tinting and extensions. According to Us Magazine, “Eyebrow tattooing is a process that eliminates the need for your favorite pencils and powders, as it defines your brows and fills in gaps. Using a microblade with tiny needles, a technician dips the tool in pigment and draws strokes identical to your existing hair. The 'tattoos' last up to 24 months.” The process can be a bit painful and costs can range between $700 to $800 according to Instyle. And some celebs have bushy brows that need very little to maintain a fuller brow look, no needle needed.
Check out which of your favorite celeb has faux brows and which are surprisingly real.
20 Faux Browed: Bella Thorne
Bella Thorne had absolutely nothing to hide when she proudly took all her followers along with her as she went to her eyebrow microblading appointment in 2016. Microblading is essentially an eyebrow tattoo. The former Disney darling shared a mystery message on her Snapchat account, “Getting it yatted,” before starting the slightly painful process. She later captured every moment on her phone as the eyebrow tattoo artist, Júlia Faria Elmassian did her work according to Us Magazine.
Bella did complain about the pain a little, but at the at the end of the session, Bella was extremely happy with the work and her new brows writing “YASSS brows” on SnapChat.
So what is microblading? New York dermatologist Dendy Engelman spoke with Vogue on the new procedure made popular in Asia. “Instead of a needle, it's a blade, which allows for a more confluent line-it takes the human error out of the dot technique. I've seen patients [looking] horrifically in the past, where the ink oxidizes to green or blue. These new techniques are much better, and the results can be really beautiful.” Microblading lasts about two years and with just a two-hour session, perfect and semi-permanent eyebrows are easily attainable.
19 Naturally Arched: Lily Collins
Lily Collins eyebrows have their own Twitter account, not run by Lily of course, but her brows have fans. So to say her eyebrows are famous is a total understatement. The account hasn't tweeted in a while but Lily's big brows are still goals. But Lily wasn't always so in love with her thick brows as she is today. "I think we all want to fit in at a young age, and we alter things about ourselves that we think are different to fit in better, and one of those things is my eyebrows.
They were so bold and very big on my face, and as a kid, I wanted to change that," she told Instyle Magazine in a video. She adds that she 'hacked away' at her brows when she was younger in an attempt to change their appearance. But her mother stepped in and had really smart advice for her daughter. She told Lily, "You need to accept the quirky things that make you different and what make you beautiful. It's the things that make you stand out that make you unique.” Obviously, her brows were resurrected after her hacking and now she keeps them natural and thick.
18 Faux Browed: Kylie Jenner
Kylie Jenner's thick full eyebrows are lust-worthy. All of the Kardashian/Jenner sisters have full thick brows although rumor has it that someone's brows in the family may get a little extra help with a secret tattoo. But Kylie's got an entirely different trick up her sleeve that makes her brows fuller than they actually are---she tints them darker. When the reality star turned mogul jumped on social media with a beautiful bare face, fans were amazed and skeptical that Kylie was all natural. After her initial lip denials, some fans don't exactly trust everything she says.
One Twitter user wrote, “I hate how @KylieJenner put on snap all natural today but those are definitely not her natural eyebrows.” Kylie caught wind of the gripe against her and sweetly wrote back. She said,
“Tinting your brows. You should try. Life changing! X.”
When another Twitter user attempted to call her out she added, “ It's not a clap back! I'm just tryna help a girl out.” So now we know how Kylie gets those fuller brows, with a dark tint. According to Marie Claire brow tint in like hair color for your brows, “A brow specialist uses a semipermanent vegetable dye to change the color of the arches, typically to darken their natural color. This results in vibrant color, a thicker-appearing hair pattern, and more definition in shape.”
17 Naturally Arched: Cara Delevingne
Big, bold bushy brows are all model turned actress Cara Delevingne has ever known, she probably ignited the bigger brows trend after years of people over-plucking their brows, leaving them sparse. But she has a super secret to her natural brows and it actually quite simple. First, she was born with them and second she barely touches then, she told The Times. "They just grow. I'm lucky with the shape. I inherited it from my grandmother. I pluck a few, but I don't shape them. I usually don't let other people touch them, just in case. Of course, they're insured for millions… I'm joking."
But like other girls, Cara wasn't always so cool with her brows. Nowadays everyone is obsessed with Cara's unique facial feature she tells Byrdie, “It's really sweet; I'm flattered. When I was a kid, I used to be really ashamed of them. I was always really scared of them because they're really big [laughs]. So it's really nice now, especially to inspire other girls to be comfortable with their own.” Cara even has her own brow gel with Rimmel, which she tells Refinery29 that she would take with her on a deserted island. "These brows have got to keep tame, so I have to use my brow gel, Brow This Way."
16 Faux Browed: Lena Dunham
Lena Dunham credits eyebrow microblading with saving her eyebrows. The Girls actress took Vogue along with her as she went to get her eyebrows tattooed on, she also wrote an essay on her journey. For years Lena thought her brows were a lost cause, “Mine were thin and pale, roughly the color of roadkill, with random hairs sprouting where they might, creating the effect of a sparse forehead rug.” She decided microblading was for her and booked an appointment with Beverly Hills-based cosmetic artist Dominique Bossavy at N.Y.C.'s Core Club. After a 40 minute session, Lena recalled being 'stunned' at her brow transformation after barely there brows.
“On my face were two perfect brows, the same hard-to-capture brown as the hair on my head, multidimensional, thick in all the right places, giving my face a grounded seriousness I had been wishing for since that day in the bathroom almost 20 years ago… "
"… As I waltzed onto Fifty-fifth Street and into a dream state, I only vaguely heard Dominique telling me it would require two more sessions to perfect my new face friends, and that I needed to avoid getting them wet for a few days while using her plant-based salve with calming chamomile and cooling cucumber to minimize itching and flaking.”
15 Naturally Arched: Emilia Clarke
Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke's natural brows are so over the top she once has an Eyebrow-off with her ARCH enemy (pun intended) model ( and fellow big browed lady) Cara Delevingne. No, the ladies have no real issues with each other they just happened to have a pair of the best bushy brows in Hollywood and they were commissioned for a duel when they both stopped by The Graham Norton Show in 2015. The ladies were vying for the title of EyeBrow Master with Arnold Schwarzenegger being one of the judges. When the duel began Cara showed off her great big brows with some good movement to the music, while Emilia's slightly smaller brows had great movement and intensity and in the end, Arnold called Emilia the winner the in the silly competition.
Emilia's mother, who was in the beauty business, taught her to love her brows at a young age she told Cosmopolitan, "My mom had rules when I was younger.” She said, “Don't touch your eyebrows,' she'd say. And I didn't and I'm so grateful for that advice. However, she did teach me to brush them with Vaseline, so I do that, but I don't fill them in or anything."
14 Faux Browed: Mandy Moore
Mandy Moore has been very honest about her microfeathered eyebrows---a lighter version of microblading for those with already full brows, who just need a little extra oomph. She confesses that she was just horrible at doing her own brows. So the This Is Us actress turned brow maven, Kristie Streicher for the microblading offshoot called, microfeathering she told NewBeauty,
“It's lighter and uses soft, feathery strokes. I was a bit of a guinea pig because I was one of the first clients she did it on. I love how she does my eyebrows, and she's the only person I would ever trust to touch them… "
"… As soon as she decided to start doing this, I was like count me in and sign me up! I wanted to be the first in line. I love it. It's one less thing to do and it's changed my whole beauty routine because I was constantly trying to fuss and fix my eyebrows so they would look the way they did when she did them, which would never happen because I'm just terrible at doing my own eyebrows.” Now Mandy has semi-permanent brows that are mostly perfect most of the time and she can concentrate on acting.
13 Naturally Arched: Sofia Vergara
Modern Family star Sofia Vergara may be a natural blonde, but her bold brow has stayed the same since she landed in Hollywood. She likes to keep them full and natural and barely plucked. Sofia's mother just like a few other mothers on this list encouraged her daughters to appreciate her brows and resist changing them. “My mother and my family, we have very thick eyebrows, and she told me not to pluck them. Eyebrows with age and with plucking -- you start to lose them. With friends my age, most of them that plucked them have very few now. I still have this full, Frida Kahlo set of eyebrows.” Sofia told TotalBeauty.
Celebrity brow guru Tonya Crooks of The BrowGal explains how to get Sofia's brows, “Put the tweezers down and give your brows a chance to thicken up. The trend going forward is big, thick, manicured brows, so do whatever it takes to make sure you get there." For those who weren't born with Sofia's grows should try products like RevitaBrow Tonya tells Refinery29. But always work with what you have since it will look most natural on your face shape, not all brows are for everyone, but you can pull inspo from celebs like Sofia.
12 Faux Browed: Gwyneth Paltrow
Gwyneth Paltrow is also a fan of micro feathering just like Mandy Moore. Gwyneth succumbed to the small eyebrow trend back in the'90s. “I've never been a person who has taken crazy, crazy beauty risks. In the '90s, there was that little eyebrow. I don't look fondly back at that little eyebrow. There were a lot of makeup errors in the '90s-the very matte thing and the thin eyebrows,” Gwyneth told Byrdie. Nowadays Gwyneth is also a fan of microfeathering by Kristie Streicher, the co-owner of Striiike in Beverly Hills.
“My goal is to create a 'brushstroke' that looks as fine and natural as native hair, focusing especially on areas that are thin or sparse,”
Kristie told W Magazine. Gwyneth hasn't spoken about her brows, but she proudly displayed Kristie's work on Instagram.
“Microblading is a form of semi-permanent cosmetic tattooing, where you deposit pigment superficially into the skin of the eyebrow. We create small incisions using a fine and very precise blade, and then add pigment into the incisions, resulting in an 'eyebrow hair.' While standard eyebrow shaping only allows me to take hair away, microblading allows me to add strokes to areas that are thin or sparse, “ Kristie added.
11 Naturally Arched: Keira Knightley
Keira Knightley has been dazzling fans with her acting since Bend It Like Beckham, but it's her bold brows that stand out. "The first tip is that when you have enormous eyebrows like mine, they need to be combed and often," she jokingly says during a video for Chanel, "And you need a professional to do it."
But most times Keira leaves her brows alone after a few accidents in the past according to Vogue, “My brow tip has always been to leave them well alone. Really early on in my career, a make-up artist said to me: you will always be able to know if someone is a good make-up artist because if they tell you to pluck your brows, run a million miles. I have always stuck to that. Partly because when I was 21, I did one of those LA brow treatments (the type of one that makes everyone's brows look the same) and it looked awful. The proportions of my face didn't work at all with less of a brow, so I am very glad they grew back! Now, I just do minor touch-ups, maybe a little tweezing, but I never touch the top. Just a little bit under the arch.”
10 Faux Browed: Madonna
When Madonna started her career in the 80's she sported her natural, unruly bushy brows, but over the years her brows have become noticeably thinner. But shhh she has a secret, she's been getting her eyebrows microbladed. Madonna has not spoken about her eye adventure, but Celebrity artist, Laura Choate, explained to DailyMail, why Madonna would utilize microblading to fill in her brows.
“Through both age and over-plucking in the past, Madonna would have lost some natural hair. She has used microblading to fill in these gaps, and create a whole new shape, and they look great… "
"… Madonna has gone for the square look which is what's in right now - everybody wants this rather than the traditional arch. The best microblading is when the brow color matches not only your natural color but also your hair roots, which is what Madonna has ensured. From here, she is then able to experiment with the depth of the arch; it is basically like an optical illusion - it's all fake.”
Microblading is over a decade old although the trend has become extremely popular in the past few years. “Microblading originated in China, over ten years ago. It's a very refined technique and has slowly filtered through to us in the West. It's become established over here in the last three years, but it's in the past year that it's just blown up. The results are so incredibly natural and realistic. I'm not knocking the machines because I've used them for years, but you can't get the same kind of nuanced results as you do with a blade with regular semi-permanent makeup, hence its popularity, ” Sian Dellar a popular permanent makeup specialist told Get The Gloss.
9 Naturally Arched: Emily Ratajkowski
Fuller brows are in right now and Emily Ratajkowski got the memo loud and clear. Emily has a pretty simple eye look she reaches for she heads out to dinner or the red carpet.“I tweeze my brows if I have any strays and brush them up with either Glossier Boy Brow or this Eyeko Brow Gel. It makes a really bushy brow-the brush really fans everything out in a way that I love. If I need to fill in any spots I use Marc Jacobs Brow Wow Defining Pencil in Ash Brown. Then I start on my eyes,” Emily told Into The Gloss.
And Emily has a super simple and easy way to tame her brows, with hairspray, she said to the NYTimes. “If I have a meeting or need to look more done up, the thing I can always do is a cat eye. I like the Revlon Colorstay liner. I have a comb for my eyebrows that I spray with Elnett. And I'm really loving Charlotte's Filmstar Bronze & Glow, which has a highlighter and a contour shade. I only use the highlighter, though. I put it on the top of my cheekbones, down the line of my nose and my Cupid's bow. I'm not big on contouring. My features are really out there already.”
8 Faux Browed: Helen Mirren
Even The Queen has faux brows, but we aren't talking about the Queen of England but rather Helen Mirren who famously played the matriarch in the movie, The Queen. So she is no stranger to a transformation, enter her new brows. Helen spoke with Daily Mail about her semi-permanent brows.
"I was fed up with my brows barely being there and when one of my girlfriends got it done, I thought that they looked great. They're very lightly and delicately done… "
"… but it means that when I get up in the morning and I have no makeup on, at least I have eyebrows. It's made a huge difference."
Helen exudes confidence, but she says she's still an insecure person.”I have experienced insecurity all my life, and I still do on a daily basis. I remember having these panic attacks but not at the obvious moments.” She adds, “Because I have never felt beautiful. There are people who are beautiful and I'm objective enough to know that I don't fit into that category. For me, still now, it's to do with wit and intelligence rather than the way I look. I don't feel clever or funny enough” according to Daily Mail.
7 Naturally Arched: Camilla Belle
Camilla Belle has that smoldering look down pact, with the help of her broody brows. When Us Magazine asked if she had any tricks for her eyebrows she said, “Those don't go away. The trick is DNA, thanks to Mom's side of the family. But also maintenance. It's about having a good brow gel and brush and making sure you're shellacking them into place. There's one make-up artist that I worked for a long time, Brett Freedman, and he made a great brow product. I use it on a daily basis. I have the brush and the gel.”
Camilla's 'brow-guy', Brett Freedman spoke with StyleCaster about Camilla's brow maintenance,
“Camilla has amazing brows. With her, less is more. I clean out in between and the strays that are very outside of the realm of the rest of the denser brow. I brush her brows up and snip the very tips off with a tiny pair of scissors… "
"… This helps to 'de-bulk' a brow and keep it looking tidy. Be careful not to trim too much. You want the brow hair to have enough length to lay naturally. I use a touch of brow gel to keep her brows very pristine with an 'up and out' brush up.”
6 Faux Browed: Ali Fedotowsky
It's been a while since Ali Fedotowsky was a Bachelorette. She actually became engaged to Roberto Martinez from her season, but that relationship fizzled out. She's been working as a TV host since leaving Facebook. Ali joined a San Diego Fox news station before moving on as an E! Correspondent. She's now on a show called, Home and Family. But since her Bachelorette days, she has gotten married to Kevin Manno, a radio and television host and she's become a mom, to daughter Molly Sullivan born July 6, 2016, and she is currently expecting baby #2 in May 2018 which is why she is looking for a few beauty shortcuts like microblading.
She proudly showed off her new eyebrows on Instagram, “Obsessed with my long and flirty lash extensions by @kelleybakerbrowslash artist @lashlovebysandy She's the best!!!! Thanks for the intro @gotogirlfriend Brows microbladed by @eyebrowdoctor My #momgoal is to avoid putting on makeup at all costs Today's look is ONLY tinted moisturizer and blush thanks to my lash extensions and brow microblading!”
And in case you were wondering Ali is no longer in any contact with Robert. “You think you're in love. But really, really, you don't know that person. When you get engaged, you probably spent a total of 72 hours with that person. We went back into the real world, and we realized we weren't right for each other," according to ABC.
5 Naturally Arched: Lucy Hale
Lucy Hale's eyebrows perfectly stand out on her face, but she reveals the secret to her brows, genetics, and skills. Lucy credits her dear old dad with “Papa Bear takes on the Couve. Ya wonder where I got my brows from?” She once wrote on Instagram.
But did you know that Lucy does her own brows most of the time she told Allure,
“People are always surprised when I say I do my eyebrows myself! As a kid, I hated my eyebrows, but now I love them. I just pluck them myself, and over the past five or ten years, I've been able to get the right shape for my face."
Celebrity eyebrow specialist Kelly Baker, who has worked with Lucy, says to stick to your brows natural shape. “Personally, I enhance what they already have. With a rounder brow, I'll fill in the outer corner. With pencil or powder, you can make the line more straight and turn it down for a more defined shape,” she told website, BeautyCrew. Never underestimate the effects of a great brow. And she says to walk away from the trimming scissors. “I don't trim at all. If you don't want them too tame, let it do its thing and find the shape after the fact.”
4 Faux Browed: Chontel Duncan
For those who may not know, Chontel Duncan is Insta-famous. Chontel is a fitness trainer who is known for her ultimate snapback after having two babies. Her body returned so quickly back to her pre-baby body that it looked like she had her abs again one week after having her baby. She can probably thank her insane dedication to fitness and her genetics. But now that she's a mom of two and an extremely popular fitness professional she needs to shave off a few minutes from her morning routine. "YES my brows are tattooed (most asked question after my height) I've needed my touch up done for ages but had to wait until I wasn't pregnant. FREAKING LOVE FEATHER TATTOOING," Chontel wrote on Instagram.
Chontel was criticized for her snapback after she showed off her svelte post-baby body. “Now before anyone jumps down my throat saying anything negative think before you type everyone is unique and different in their own special way. There is no "one" journey or one way, this is my "normal". No one is forced to follow my account/s, I openly share my life for all who appreciate it, that includes the highs and the lows. I am only one person, so therefore I cannot possibly relate to everyone's experience. If your instant response isn't positive I challenge you to see beyond your negativity and find the kindness within,“ she wrote on Instagram in 2017 to her almost 600K followers.
3 Naturally Arched: Chloe Grace Moretz
Hollywood starlet Chloe Grace Moretz's eyebrows have been cradling her lovely face for years. She tells Allure that she refuses to let people touch her brows, "Not plucking my eyebrows has been a really big deal in my life. Forcing people not to touch them, because everyone tries to pluck them."
Chloe is very low-maintenance with her essentials daytime beauty look for every day she told Vogue.
“Pat McGrath's glow stick is amazing. I'm completely obsessed. I don't wear any makeup anymore when I'm not working-just that little bit of shimmer… "
"… And then Chantecaille cover stick, underneath the eyes and in the nasolabial fold. An eyebrow brush and eyebrow gel, too. That's all you need.” Maybe all she needs but others need a little more.
Chloe's love life has been in the news lately. The actress recently split from her on-off relationship with Brooklyn Beckham, the celebrity seed of Victoria and David Beckham. According to W Magazine Chloe seemingly confirmed the split with Brooklyn after she posted a screenshot of the song she's been listening to, Cardi B's "Be Careful." With lyrics about infidelity, we can only assume the diss was a gesture to her ex-boyfriend who was reportedly spotted kissing another girl according to W Magazine.
2 Faux Browed: Huda Kattan
Huda Kattan is known for her makeup empire and enormous social media presence, so when she decided to get her brows Microbladed, it was not a quick decision. The beauty guru wrote about her decision on her website, HudaBeauty, to get her eyebrows tattooed on. “I'd been thinking about microblading for a really long time, and it got to the point where my brows were becoming a frustrating part of my makeup routine. I was spending so much time on my brows every day, it would take me five to ten minutes, even 15 minutes sometimes, which is ridiculous - I mean who has time for that?!… "
"… But I just had so many sparse patches, missing hairs, and with my love for bold brows, they were just too thin; I hated how they looked without makeup, and they made me look much older. So, I'd do my brows every day, but the more products I used, the more my hairs kept falling out, and it became a vicious cycle. I literally felt like I needed to get my brows microbladed to limit the amount of product I needed to use, and of course, to give me more precious minutes in the day. I'll be honest, I had no idea how much work you need to put into the process, so I hope you can learn something from my experience if you're considering microblading.”
1 Naturally Arched: Brooke Shields
Brooke Shields is one of the originators of the perfectly full brow. Her Blue Lagoon brows were protected by her mother a child actress from overzealous makeup artists she tells Instyle Magazine. “When I was a kid, I didn't have any concept of beauty. Maybe it was because I was self-conscious-or because everyone else was taking care of my hair and makeup for me. I wouldn't even look in the mirror when someone did my makeup. They'd ask me, 'How do you feel?' And I'd say, 'Looks great!' It was kind of boring to sit in those chairs at the time. The fun part was when you got to act and play.”
She continues,
“Thankfully, my mom was always very protective of my look. She practically threatened to break the fingers of any makeup artist who approached me with tweezers. She didn't have the foresight to think the eyebrows were going to be iconic… "
"… Her feeling was, 'This is who she is. If you want this, this is what you get. We're not going to change anything.'” And her mother was right, not only were Brooke's eyebrows revered, she was ahead of the curve in terms of trends. Nowadays people lust for brows like Brooke.
References: Us Magazine, Instyle, Us Magazine, Vogue,Instyle,Marie Claire,TheTimes, Byrdie, Refinery29,Vogue, The Graham Norton Show, Cosmopolitan, NewBeauty,TotalBeauty, Refinery29,Byrdie, W Magazine,Chanel , Vogue,DailyMail, Get The Gloss, Into The Gloss, NY Times, DailyMail, Us Magazine, StyleCaster, Instagram, ABC, Instagram, Allure, BeautyCrew, Instagram, Instagram, Allure, Vogue ,W Magazine, HudaBeauty,Instyle