Etude House Drawing Eye Brow Slim pencil review

Let’s try out some more K-beauty products shall we? I did a full face of Asian products earlier in the year but often times after using a product just once will not give you a good enough feel for it. It can take a few uses before you know exactly what a product can do. That is certainly how I feel about this brow pencil from Etude House. It is a nice brow pencil for sure, but now that I have used this for 6+ weeks on a daily basis I definitely feel a little less exciting about it than I initially thought. Here’s why.

Review: Etude House Drawin Slim Eye Brow pencil 04 Gray Brown

I got this pencil in the shade gray brown as I like an ashy, lighter brow pencil for my fair complexion. My brows are quite dark naturally, especially for a blonde, but I find it looks too stark if I match my brows to my natural brow color. So I try to match it with my hair color instead. This pencil is available in 6 different shades and I got mine from the Yesstyle website. There the pencil retails for a mere €4.65. So that is not too expensive. The price point is certainly not the issue here.

What does this brow pencil have to offer?

As far as brow pencils go this is quite possible one of the most basic ones I have tried. It is a twist up brow pencil which means no sharpening is required. You get a spoolie on one end and the product on the other. I bought mine after I heard Youtube Arna Arlayne raving about this. She said she loved it and so I was looking forward to try it. At first I really loved it too, but now that I have used it more I have found two major drawbacks about this product that makes me not love it as much as I had expected.

What can you expect from this brow pencil?

The reason why I liked this pencil at first was how precise this was: it is a very skinny pencil that is very easy to apply neatly to the brows. If you like a very precise, sharp brow, then this is a great one for you. But I am not about that sharp brow life and I like mine to look fluffy and ‘uneven’. I like that unpolished look to my brows. After using this for a few weeks back to back I have also discovered why this product is so precise: it is incredibly hard to the point where it sometimes ‘scratches’ on. It doesn’t hurt to use it or anything but I find that this product can tug at my brow area just to get it to go on and can therefore be a bit difficult to use. Personally, I prefer a slightly softer and creamier brow pencil.

How does this pencil swatch?

So that would be problem no. 1: the texture of the product. My second problem? The shade. At first I thought it looked okay, but I find that this is just not ashy enough for my taste. This brow product sadly suffers from what many cheap brow pencils suffer from: looking red/ orange in the brow. Great if you have that type of hair color, but for a shade called ‘gray brown’ I had expected it to be much more cool toned. This now makes my brows look warm and that is just not a good look. Is it noticeable in real life from a distance? No. No one has come up to me to say: hey your brows look red! But still, I notice it for sure.

How does this brow pencil apply?

As I mentioned this is a hard pencil that is super precise. Case in point: this before and after picture. You can also see here with what I mean in terms of this looking quite warm on me. Yes it looks nice, but this product simply doesn’t hold a candle to my longstanding favorite: Soap & Glory’s Archery Brow Pencil. Yes that review is old, but I have used up so many of those in the past 6+ years that I know exactly what it does. This just doesn’t come anywhere near it and combined with the hardness of the pencil it just doesn’t make this my all time favorite brow product.

My final thoughts

After trying the Lovely Cookie Blusher by Etude House and loving it, I was hoping this brow product would blow me away as much as that blush did. Sadly this is not the case. Is this product okay for the amount of money it retails for? For sure, but I would rather spend a little bit more and get a super great looking brow. Is it easy enough to use? Yes: this is definitely not a bad product, it just has a few issues for me that made me not love this product.

Would I recommend the Etude House Drawing Slim eye brow pencil?

Only if you like a very precise, stencilled brow look and if you can find a shade that is right for you. I had a look at the shades available and most of the lighter shades look to be quite warm. The darker ones do seem to go a bit more cool toned, which is good. So if you can find a shade that matches your brows and you just want an affordable brow pencil that gives you that sharp brow result then this is for you. If you are like me and you like your brows fluffy, ashy and undone, then this is not up your alley.

What affordable brow pencil do you love?