Jizzbrows and the Budget Eye Lift

Few things are as gratifying, at this point in my life, as beauty products that cheat an instant eye lift. I try not to obsess over the changes my face is naturally experiencing as I get older (my face is a bloody TRAITOR! I genuinely believed I was a genetic marvel and that I would be too biologically superior to do anything so mundane as to age!) but the gradual loss of space between eye lid and eyebrow does irk me.

It’s possibly the thing that makes me look the most tired - and not tired in a “oh did you sleep badly? you have very dark circles” sort of way, either. More long-term tired. Like a wizard who has endured centuries of Ork/Troll warfare and has just about had enough. Drawn-out, “I’ve seen things” tiredness.

Anyway, this is why I love anything that can give me an instant cheat’s eye lift. There are three really excellent things I can think of off the top of my head: microcurrent devices, eyeshadow tricks and brow-lifting. And I shall briefly run through the first two before landing on the whole point of this post, which is - gratifyingly - a budget option.

Ad info: no paid or sponsored content. I have worked with ZIIP and E.L.F. in the past but this post does not form any part of that work. Post contains affiliate links.

ZIIP Halo

The first cheat’s eye lift is a relatively pricey one but still a fraction of the cost of an actual eye lift, I imagine, and doesn’t involve having to have any injections, anaesthetic, scalpels or staples. (I don’t know for sure whether all of those things are involved in an eye lift, I’m just broadly referring to the relative faff and trauma of having medical things done to your face rather than just sitting at home watching Youtube videos about treating succulent plant diseases whilst running a metal handheld device over your skin.)

The device I’m on about is the ZIIP Halo, which is an at-home microcurrent facial toner and lifter. Oooph it’s good. I’m not going to go on at length because I often work with ZIIP and I don’t want to turn this into an advertorial but if you’ve seen any of my previous video demos you will have seen how this leaves my eyebrows about two inches higher than where they started off. I have to be careful how long I use it for, because I worry, sometimes, that I might end up looking as though I’ve been cattle prodded.

It works by contracting and relaxing facial muscles so that they temporarily tighten and lift. I get a good day’s lift out of my six minute session and treat it as a mandatory skincare step if I’m going to be doing “proper” makeup and going on camera or out into the actual world.

You can find the ZIIIP Halo here online - if you use RUTHZIIP you should get 10% off, though it is a code from a previous collaboration with them so let me know if it doesn’t work.

Me holding the ZIIP Halo in a whimsical kind of manner.

The Shadow Trick

OK, my second cheat for an eye lift: using a dark liner or shadow just at the corner of the eye and flicking it up and out in a little line towards the end of your eyebrow. We’re talking half a centimetre, here, not an actual wing, and you need a tiny little buffing brush to soften it all out so that it’s almost imperceptible, but that small smudge of darkness just leads the line of the upper eyelid upwards rather than downwards, which is where it naturally goes. I can tell I’m going to have to do a video on this, I have just added it to my to-do list and I will be back with a demo tout de suite. I must have shown this on film at least fifty times but can I find a single one of those videos in my extensive Youtube archive? No I can not. I will film a new one tomorrow.

Brow-Lifting Gels

Right. Jizzbrows. I’m sorry, I keep saying Jizzbrows and I actually detest the word “jizz”, it’s so basic, but it sounded funny at the time and now I can’t think of a better phrase. It’s also really quite accurate in the visuals it conjures up. Because my trusted brow gel, the Anastasia Brow Freeze Gel, has had something weird happen to it (I haven’t even had it that long!) and every time I comb it through my brow hairs it leaves dried up, rubbery strands of white stuff. Goes on clear-ish, but it dries as though I’ve used the same “hair gel” as Cameron Diaz in Something About Mary.

It’s all incredibly distressing, really. I hate it when a beauty product malfunctions this badly. I’ve given it four or five chances and the white stuff is stubbornly clinging on and so it looks as though the Brow Freeze Gel is heading for the bin.

Fortunately I have the original Brow Freeze, a waxy gel in a pot that you first apply with a flat brush, all over the eyebrows, and then comb into place with a spoolie. (Looks like a mascara wand or a tiny, weeny toilet brush.)

Anastasia Beverly Hills Brow Freeze in-a-pot is, in my opinion, a 10/10 makeup product. Alright so the double brush application is a bit of a faff and then you have a spoolie with congealed wax-gel to deal with, and the wax-gel has to be virtually melted off with a convoluted process involving boiling water and a succession of egg cups and pieces of kitchen roll but the EFFECT OF IT IS BRILLIANT!

You know those people who have perfectly feathered brows? That are arched upwards and look as though they’ve been painted on stroke by stroke with a watercolour brush? That’s how Brow Freeze makes your eyebrows look! I do have a demo video for this. I planned ahead and I filmed it and it is here on Youtube (click here) or Instagram (here!) for your viewing pleasure.

See how these waxy brow gels completely lift the eye area? I’m sorry if I get excited about this sort of thing, but any low-key effort I can make to gain higher-than-average beauty benefits just sends me apoplectic with joy. And the best thing is that the brow hairs stay in place all day, and there’s no colour to worry about or fibres or anything that could potentially go wrong: you’re basically just working with a slightly less sticky version of school glue.

For the easy brow perfection I can achieve with Anastasia Brow Freeze, I will forgive it the faff and it doesn’t even lose a point from its rating - you can find Brow Freeze online here*, it is currently on offer at Look Fantastic.

But wait: what could be better than a 10/10 beauty product? I shall tell you, if you haven’t already worked it out from the video that you should have just watched. Something that is virtually the same product, but a quarter of the price. An actual fraction of the cost. If I could give this thing an eleven out of ten then I would: it does everything that Brow Freeze does, is even slightly more effective, and it costs just six quid.

Hello E.L.F. Clear Brow Lift!*

What a steal. It’s a smidgen more gel-like and less waxy than the Anastasia, but I think that it gives individual hairs slightly more definition, if anything. Holds the same, has the same degree of absolute foolproofness, and if you’re saving your pennies then I could not think of a better budget buy to throw into your daily makeup routine. Not a Jizzbrow to be seen, either. Find it at:

E.L.F. here* £6

Boots here* £6

E.L.F. also do a dedicated Brow Lift Applicator and I would absolutely recommend getting it so that you don’t have to apply your brow product with the handle of an eyeliner brush, which is what I do. You can get the applicator here*, it’s £4.