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With perfectly symmetrical and grown-in eyebrows like these, it’s no wonder that Zendaya gets asked about her eyebrows a lot. After all, she’s made it a point — on Instagram, during red carpets, and in interviews — to herald the expertly manicured eyebrow and all it can do for framing one’s face.

“Do your brows,” she recommended for those looking to feel glamorous on a bad day. “I’ve been blessed with good eyebrows, and I’ve worked very hard for them. Get a good brow pencil, fill them in a bit, make them perfect, and I guarantee you’ll feel better,” she told Elle.

But all that brow wisdom doesn’t just appear out of nowhere. Back in the day when Zendaya was an eyebrow novice, she learned the hard way — like most of us do — that the eyebrows can be both the key to one’s glam look and the downfall.

“First day of seventh grade, I went to get my eyebrows waxed, and the lady jacked me up,” she told InStyle. “They were thin — one was circular, and one was square. Never again! From that point on I did my own eyebrows.”

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Girl certainly makes a case for those wanting to experiment with manicuring their own brows at home. First of all, it can be difficult to find an eyebrow manicurist (waxer, threader, etc.) that’s trustworthy. Not to mention, keeping up eyebrow appointments can be time-consuming and super expensive. Depending on how quickly your hair grows back, an eyebrow technician might want you to pop in every 3-4 weeks. Combine that with how much it can cost to get your eyebrows expertly done — upwards of $20 in some areas — and that’s a whole lot of cash you’re shelling out just for brows.

So take a cue from Zendaya and learn how to shape, tweeze, and cut your own eyebrows at home. If you follow the below step-by-step instructions, we guarantee you’ll never have to set foot in an eyebrow technician’s waiting room again. Keep reading for more eyebrow tips!

What You’ll Need

Manicure scissors

Spoolie

Tweezers

Step 1: Comb brows down with a spoolie

It’s best to work with your brows directly after taking a shower. Whether you’re plucking or trimming them, the warmth of the water stimulates the follicles, making them more open and ready to be pulled out by the root. (It also makes it hurt less!) Also, when it comes to trimming, it’s easier to comb down longer hairs if they’re wet. It makes it more clear to see which hairs are longer and need to be cut down.

Using the spoolie (you can even wet the spoolie if you’re not manicuring after taking a shower), comb brows down toward the eye, focusing on the longer pieces that hang down from the main shape of the eyebrow. These longer hairs are the ones that you’ll be trimming.

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Step 2: Trim longer hairs

Using a manicure scissor — please, please, please DO NOT use a regular-sized scissor; I’m speaking from experience, it’s so much harder, I can send you pics — trim one hair at a time. With a light hand, position one blade of the scissor right on the skin, then when you have the hair directly in between the blades, lightly snip it. I say lightly because if you cut using too heavy a hand, you may end up snipping closer to the root (and the skin!) than you’d like to.

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Step 3: Tweeze excess stray hairs

Let’s start with the three golden rules of tweezing: pluck in good lighting, tweeze the hair away in the same direction of its growth, and like I said before, tweeze with open follicles, AKA after the shower or washing your face with warm/hot water.

Using tweezers, pluck away any stray hairs down below the brow line. Try to keep away from any hairs that will change the overall shape of your brows. When it comes to trimming and plucking, it’s best to let hairs take their natural growing course rather than completely manipulate the natural shape of the brow.

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That’s all it takes — only three simple steps. Now that your brows are perfectly manicured, feel free to do whatever you want with them: fill them in or leave ’em au naturale. To keep brows looking (inevitably) fleek, adhere to a loose schedule of trimming them once a month, tweezing a couple times of week (but not to reshape, only to snag the strays), and shaping them fully every 3-4 weeks.

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Finished product, eyebrows not filled in.

All photos courtesy of Steph Osmanski.