If you try one product this week, make it this £1 eyebrow pencil that I wear every single day

Not just a '90s nostalgia trip, Natural Collection's relaunched makeup far outperforms its price tag

a marble backdrop containing an image of a hand with red fingernails holding up a natural collection eyebrow pencil on a green backdrop, plus an image of beauty editor Fiona McKim smiling with blonde hair and a green blazer
(Image credit: Future / Fiona McKim)

At the risk of sounding approximately 105 years old, you don't get much for a pound these days, do you?

This is especially true of beauty shopping. A sub-quid expenditure might stretch to a box of cotton buds or whatever lurid-hued shower gel is on special offer, but not anything particularly desirable or aspirational.

So imagine my surprise and delight on encountering one of the best eyebrow pencils for hair that's blond, light brunette, grey (or a mixture of all the above, like mine), ringing in at precisely £1.

Why this £1 eyebrow pencil is my beauty buy of the week

The first thing you might think when you see this pencil (if you're a child of the '80s or thereabouts) is, wow, Natural Collection, they're still going!

This brand makes me fizz with nostalgia in the same way as The Body Shop or C&A. One glance and I'm back cruising the aisles of Boots Princes Street, crumpled fiver in my pocket, determined to squeeze maximum glamour out of my paper round pittance.

In those days, my shopping list was dewberry body spray and redcurrant lip salve-centric, but my overplucked tadpole brow shape could really have benefited from this 2024-launched eyebrow definer.

Beauty editor Fiona Mckim pictured with blonde hair and a black T shirt, in two side by side images, one before applying natural collection eyebrow pencil and one afterward, with defined eyebrows

My still-recovering from overplucking brows (l) before and (r) after applying Natural Collection Brow Pencil

(Image credit: Future / Fiona McKim)

One caveat: the reason I say this is good for fair hair is that it lacks the firmness to create anything resembling a sharply defined 'power brow'. So if you have naturally dark, full eyebrows and that's the look you go for, I think this would actually be too soft.

I'll also flag that, as expected for a quid, Natural Collection will not furnish you with any added extras here - like a twist-up nib that never needs sharpening or a spoolie on the end. This is an eyebrow pencil, plain and simple.

But honestly, for the price, you really can't knock makeup as good as this. It's the best thing £1 can buy since a bag of chips went up to £2.50 - plus, you get a cute nostalgia trip thrown in for free. Sounds good? Great! Let's chat next Sunday.

Fiona McKim
Beauty Editor, womanandhome.com

As woman&home's Beauty Channel Editor, Fiona Mckim loves to share her 15+ years of industry intel on womanandhome.com and Instagram (@fionamckim if you like hair experiments and cute shih-tzus). After interning at ELLE, Fiona joined woman&home as Assistant Beauty Editor in 2013 under industry legend Jo GB, who taught her to understand ingredients and take a cynical approach to marketing claims. She has since covered every corner of the industry, interviewing dermatologists and celebrities from Davina McCall to Dame Joan Collins, reporting backstage at London Fashion Week and judging the w&h Beauty Awards.

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