You may have noticed that the little pink caravan - whose name is Gloria by the way - that used to sit in the car park at Cycle 360 has moved.

Working Week went to find out more and discovered a successful business built on brows.

Eyebrows have long been acknowledged as the vital element in shaping your face and setting off the eyes beneath.

In Georgian times highly fashionable ladies would glue on strips of mouse fur if their brows lacked volume. By contrast, in the 1920s and 30s brows were tweezed right off and pencilled in as a thin line instead.

And who can forget the Scouse brow?

Nowadays we’re after a more relaxed, natural look, according to Katherine Mather, who has built a successful business around her expertise with eyebrows.

’The trend now is to have more natural brows: a lot of girls are leaving their brows now or not using as much product.

’My whole vision when it comes to eyebrows is to make them really natural and also low maintenance so you’re not worried about having to pencil them,’ she says.

A degree in fashion communications gave Katherine an eye for style and proportion but it was a summer job working for Benefit cosmetics that gave her a real understanding of what brow products can do.

She recalls: ’This was in Liverpool in 2013, at the height of the Scouse brow - Benefit was good training for what brows really should be.

’When I moved back to the island I was still doing part-time work for Benefit and doing graphic design on the side.

’I ended up being asked to help manage a new beauty salon in Douglas where I did the graphic design, marketing and management.

’Then I trained with HD Brows for 18 months: I’d had the idea for the caravan when I was at Benefit and I mentioned it to my husband, Chris, and he said: "That’s a genius idea."

’I think he gave me the confidence that I needed and we started putting a business plan together.’

The next step was to track down a vintage caravan that could be redesigned and refurbished to Katherine’s specifications.

She says: ’We managed to find a company in the UK, in Bognor Regis, who specialise in renovations: they’re called The Little Vintage Caravan Workshop.

’This caravan was a just rust bucket, no floor, just a shell but they completely renovated it a over about 12 months with a lot of backwards and forwards, finalising the design and how it would work for me.’

In April 2018 she brought the caravan back to the island and set up in business.

She says: ’When I first brought it back the idea for the van was as a pop up vehicle that I could do events from.

’The first event was Bushy’s TT Village that was wonderful. I did parties and hen parties, also doing makeups, and I started to see that what people wanted, especially client based business, was to have that continuity of going to the same place each time.

’I actually became pregnant about six months later and I realised that I was going to have to tailor the business slightly differently.

’That’s when I teamed up with Cycle 360 and I did pop ups between there and Tynwald Mills.

’At first it was only a few days a week but I’ve just got busier and busier since having my little girl.

’Then since we came out of lockdown the need for brows has completely taken off and I was looking at increasing my days.’

With the increase in business and the need for weekend working Katherine needed a more permanent site and she has now moved the van just across the road to a secluded corner of the car park at the side of Eden Park.

’It’s a lot more private here and that’s really good, especially when the men come for their eyebrows.

’I love doing men’s eyebrows, they’re so good to do,’ says Katherine.

She offers all the usual lash tints and tidies, threading and lash lifts and says that the most popular treatment at the moment is Brow Lamination which she says is ’essentially a brow lift, almost like a perm for the eyebrows, so if hairs go in the wrong direction, it makes the hair pliable so you can style it.’

It all goes to show that being really good at one thing, and providing it in fun setting, is one recipe for business success.

However, there is one small problem that Katherine foresees for the future, as she explains: ’My little girl, Graihagh, is two in October and I’m sure she’ll want to have this as her Wendy house at some point.’