Meet the Makeup Pen You’ll Never Throw Away
I bet you have a product or two in your beauty collection that rarely gets a look in. Not because it’s bad, but because it’s too good. I’m talking about that Trudon candle that’s too beautiful to burn, or that Creed fragrance you save for special occasions. If I’m right (which I’m sure I am), Karen Betts thinks it’s time you got over it.
Betts, who already has two beauty brands under her belt — HD Brows and LVL Lash Lift — has returned with a new launch, and it’s one she’s putting her own name on. It’s The KB Pen, and it’s built around ‘beauty without occasion’, a philosophy that’s all about actually using the nice things rather than saving them for best.
“For years, the beauty industry has encouraged us to save the good stuff for special occasions,” says Betts. “But I’ve never believed luxury should sit in a drawer waiting for permission to be used.”
The KB Pen is a metal pen that houses twist-up makeup cartridges for the eyes, brows, and lips. It’s a forever beauty product where the only repeat purchase is the cartridge. It cuts down on plastic waste, and you can even keep a few cartridges on hand to switch from a warm nude lip one day to a rich berry brown the next.
The case is gorgeous. It’s crafted from precision-turned stainless steel with a PVD coating, the same kind used in fine watchmaking. It also comes in three jewellery-inspired finishes that can be mixed and matched to create nine hardware combinations in total.
At £95 (which includes one cartridge), it’s not exactly an impulse purchase, but then that’s rather the point — it’s here for the long haul. Betts describes it as the world’s first luxury, customisable beauty tool. Whether or not you buy that, it’s hard to imagine it getting forgotten about at the bottom of your makeup bag.
“I wanted to create something that wasn’t just another cosmetic pencil, but a piece people would genuinely love to own,” she says. “Something beautifully engineered, endlessly refillable and designed to stay with you for years, not weeks.”
It’s easy to use too. Just pop the cap off a cartridge and push it into the pen’s metal cap. Screw the cartridge into the barrel, close it up, and wait for the click. That’s it. When product runs out, you twist off the old one, twist in a new one, and you’re good to go.
As for the cartridges (£25 each), brows get a pencil with a flat, V-shaped tip for fine, hair-like strokes, in three shades from cool dark brown to light ash. Betts, who has spent decades in permanent makeup, also recommends it for topping up faded microblading between appointments. For eyes, there are four Velvet Eye shades, running from deep matte black to emerald green, all designed to glide on without tugging and stay where you put them. There are 12 lip liner shades, ranging from nudes to deep berries, and the brand says the velvet-matte finish is waterproof and kiss-proof.
The KB Pen is available now at karenbetts.com, exclusively in the UK.