Amber Harrison, owner of Brow Envy, is a licensed semi-permanent makeup artist and eyebrow expert who turned her passion for perfect brows into a profession.
“It dawned on me that brow design is my passion. It’s such a critical part of a person’s face, yet so many people struggle with having sparse eyebrows, drawing them daily, trying to get the right shape,” Harrison says.
Harrison was already threading, filling and designing her friends, family and co-workers eyebrows but she was looking for the best of both worlds: a natural looking brow with more staying power than makeup. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention so Harrison decided to take her research deeper and discovered a more natural looking approach – the Microblading technique.
Microblading has been featured in numerous magazines such as Allure, Instyle, Teen Vogue and Elle. It’s been featured on shows like The Doctors and on E! Online, with many celebrities like actress Bella Thorne posting about their positive Microblading experiences. In fact, there’s currently more than 745,000 hashtagged posts on Instagram about Microblading. Definitely a huge boom in demand, and for good reason.
Meeting that demand is now Brow Envy. It’s the first studio in Greater Cincinnati to specialize solely in Microblading, which is a semi-permanent makeup technique, which like traditional permanent makeup is a tattoo but there are some big differences.
“Many of my Ohio, Kentucky and even Pennsylvania clients were planning to — or did — travel long distances like to the west coast or New York for Microblading,” Harrison says, “but now they now longer have to and come to Brow Envy in Cincinnati! Many of my clients travel from a few hours away.”
The most common type of traditional eyebrow tattoos involves the use of a tattoo gun and a block style brow, which leaves the client with a dark outlined eyebrow and no depth. Harrison says “Microblading by Brow Envy leaves the client with crisp, thin lines that look identical to real hair. After consultation, a selection of pigment is carefully chosen to give depth and shape so that the natural brows and microbladed strokes blend seamlessly.”
Microblading on average fades over the course of 18 months with normal skin exfoliation. It creates fine hair strokes that don’t blur over time or fade into unusual colors like you would experience with a traditional permanent makeup machine. According to Harrison this makes for very realistic results.
Harrison explains that “Microblading is a tattoo and it requires a lot of practice and education” which is why her studio specializes in eyebrows. For Harrison “brow design is just as important as the service itself. I look at bone structure and the client’s facial features and design a brow that best suits them. This is something that can only be truly perfected with complete focus on this technique.”
With each client, she spends about at their first appointment designing the right brows for them, and then two hours at their touch up appointment. “Not only do I focus on creating amazing brows, it’s just as important to me that each client have an amazing experience,” she says. “Customer service is extremely important to me. I take my time with each client and give them my full attention in the studio.”
Brown Envy, which just opened in July 2017 in the Rookwood Exchange (one of the suites inside Salons by JC) located at 3825 Edwards Road. In 2017, she plans to expand into a bigger space and will offer additional eyebrow services such as threading, natural brow design, brow extensions and more.
Microblading typically starts at about $450, but varies based on specific requests and special promotions. See lots of before and after photos, and learn more about Harrison and Brow Envy on their website, Instagram page or Facebook.