PAMELA Anderson has become almost as famous for her make-up-free look as for the iconic red swimsuit she rocked on Baywatch.

At the SAG Awards in February, she oozed confidence in a flowing ivory gown, a smattering of diamonds – and not a scrap of slap.

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At first, some commentators wondered if her fresh-faced look was a stunt. But over the past year, the 57-year-old star has become a poster girl for natural beauty.

As the type of person who, at 47, wouldn’t consider popping to the shops without her make-up on, I pored over Pam’s most recent red-carpet pics with envy.

But while she looked undeniably stunning, I couldn’t help wondering whether she regrets her Noughties-style eyebrows as much as I do.

When I grab my make-up bag each morning, the very first thing I do is reach for my eyebrow kit and do my best to fill out my barely-there brows. Like Pamela’s super-skinny arches, mine are thin and wispy.

This is due to zealous over-plucking back when tweezers – rather than today’s eyebrow brushes, gels, powders and stencils – were a girl’s best friend.

In the late-Nineties and early-Noughties, thin eyebrows were all the rage. Stars including Paris Hilton, Jennifer Aniston, Mila Kunis and, of course, Pammy, ditched their bushy brows for the female equivalent of a pencil moustache.

Along with super-low-rise jeans with a ‘whale tail’ at the back (meaning you had the top of your thong showing), having skinny, arched eyebrows was the ‘in’ thing.

And although I was by no means a trend-setter, this was one bandwagon I was happy to jump on.

As a teenager, I’d sported big, bushy eyebrows that seemed desperate to meet each other in the middle of my forehead.

Despite occasional comments from unkind classmates – whose imaginations didn’t stretch much further than shouting ‘EYEBROWS’ – I tried not to let it bother me.

But then the trend for sleek brows filtered down from MTV to the high street. Suddenly, the contrast between my caterpillar-like fuzz and everyone else’s oh-so-sleek brows became too obvious to ignore.

For the first time, I grabbed a pair of tweezers. And so began a years-long love affair with ridding myself of all but the smallest smattering of eyebrow hair.

Eventually, when celebs started embracing their brows again, I stopped plucking with quite so much enthusiasm.

But, stuck in a beauty rut, I still found myself reaching for my trusty tweezers to keep everything in check well into my thirties.

I carried on quite happily, until a colleague’s throwaway comment made me realise my plucking habit had continued well past its sell-by-date.

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At the time, I was a writer for a glossy women’s magazine. And like most magazines back then, our office boasted what was called a ‘freebie table’ – a spot in the office where members of staff could leave unwanted gifts.

One fateful day, a friend on the features desk picked up a hat someone on the fashion team had cast away – a knitted beanie with eyebrows sewn into the fold-up brim.

I eventually used my top-level journalism training to dig out the obvious truth: while my eyebrows were living in the past, the world had moved on

My friend pushed the hat onto her head and said: “You could do with one of these, Rosie.”

I laughed along with everyone else, but was secretly confused. What could she mean? The implication was that I didn’t have any eyebrows.

But I did, of course. I had my lovely, skinny Noughties brows.

I eventually used my top-level journalism training to dig out the obvious truth: while my eyebrows were living in the past, the world had moved on.

I simply hadn’t realised just how far behind the times I had fallen.

Fifteen years ago, stars such as Cara Delevingne – dubbed ‘Her Eyebrowness’ by the press – made thick, luscious brows the new ‘in’ thing.

The monobrow phase I’d tried to escape was suddenly the height of fashion. Yet here I was, still sporting my Skinny Minnies.

Mortified, I decided to ditch the tweezers for good and regrow my fluffy brows. Once they’d made a comeback, I vowed to book an appointment with a brow technician.

I’d get them shaped into natural neatness and leave the Noughties behind me for good.

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Gone for good

While I waited, I blagged products and tips from the beauty team so I could learn how to create some semblance of hair from what I had left.

But I soon realised that underneath my carefully applied brow pomade, nothing was happening.

At first, I wasn’t too worried. Back in my teenage years, I accidentally glued my left eye shut while applying fake nails – which is another story altogether.

To help prise it open, medics in A&E plucked out all my eyelashes. They took several long months to grow back, and I thought perhaps eyebrows were the same.

I tried to relax. But when months passed and only a couple of stray hairs had returned, I started to panic. A quick Google told me that over-plucking can damage the hair follicle – permanently.

What if they never grew back?

On the beauty team’s advice, I tried some remedies, including applying rosemary oil, which is proven to encourage hair growth.

But after a year, I had to accept that my once-fluffy, suddenly super-fashionable brows were gone for good.

Instead, my over-plucked eyebrows are here to stay – and I’m filled with regret.

Brows frame your face and accentuate your eyes. When yours are giving off a Where’s Wally? vibe, it can leave you feeling like your face isn’t fully furnished.

Fed up with having to fake it every morning, in 2023 I took the plunge and decided to get my eyebrows microbladed – a semi-permanent tattoo that mimics the look of natural brows.

Having heard various horror stories about the results, I was pretty nervous. But after two sessions, I was thrilled with how I looked.

For the first time in decades, I woke up each morning with my eyebrows fully intact, even if it was an optical illusion.

But microblading costs upward of £100, takes hours to perfect and doesn’t last forever. So 18 months on, I’m back to square one.

I can still see remnants of the great job my eyebrow technician did, so I use it to guide my brow-filling technique.

20 years is a long time to wait for your face to come back into fashion

Luckily for me (and, perhaps, Pamela), the skinny eyebrow look has recently enjoyed a comeback.

The Y2K trend has seen forty-somethings like me raiding their wardrobes for forgotten clothes that are now considered ‘vintage’.

It’s also meant that stars including Bella Hadid, Jodie Turner-Smith and Rihanna have all been seen sporting retro skinny brows.

When I tried the viral TikTok filter designed to show how you’d fare with this throwback look, I thought it wasn’t working.

But then I realised the problem: the look was so similar to my actual eyebrows, it was impossible to tell the difference.

Technically, I’m on-trend all over again. But I would still offer a loud word of warning to anyone tempted to tweeze.

I’d urge you to embrace your beautiful, bushy brows.

The barely-there look might feel fabulous now, but it will only last until the next up-and-coming celeb decides to buck the trend.

Then, like me, you might be stuck staring at the past whenever you look in the mirror.

Getting back what you’ve lost takes time, money and effort. And take it from me: 20 years is a long time to wait for your face to come back into fashion.

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