Cosmetic dentistry
Most people who ask about veneers need whitening and one afternoon of bonding. We will tell you that, even though it is the smaller job, because a smile that still looks right in fifteen years is the only version worth paying for.
What you dislike is often not what is actually wrong. Shade, proportion, the line of your lip and how much tooth shows at rest all get looked at.
Whitening before bonding, bonding before veneers, veneers before crowns. Enamel does not grow back.
You see the plan and the cost of each stage before anything begins.
Four routes, often combined.
Supervised in-office or custom take-home trays. Cheapest, and reversible in the sense that nothing is removed.
Tooth-coloured composite shaped straight onto the tooth. Chips, small gaps and worn edges, usually one visit.
Thin ceramic bonded to the front of the tooth. Shape, shade and alignment at once, when the others cannot get there.
Function before appearance
A cosmetic result that ignores how your teeth meet does not last. Porcelain on a bite that grinds will chip, and the patient gets blamed for it.
Before anything is specified we look at how your jaw closes, whether you grind, and where the wear already is. Sometimes that changes the plan. Occasionally it means a night guard is the first thing we make for you.
Questions
Only if it is badly designed. Teeth that look artificial are usually the wrong proportion, too uniform, or a shade lighter than the patient's own face supports. That is a design failure, not a material one.
Typically a year or two before it needs topping up, depending on coffee, tea, red wine and smoking. Take-home trays make topping up cheap.
Purely cosmetic work generally is not. Where a treatment is also restoring a damaged tooth there may be partial coverage, and we will check before you commit.
With a consultation. Bring a photograph of your own smile from ten years ago if you have one — it is more useful than a picture of somebody else's.
Shape, shade and alignment corrected together.
Explore →In-office and take-home, supervised either way.
Explore →Chips and gaps, usually in a single visit.
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Clear aligners you can take out to eat.
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The step between a filling and a crown.
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When a tooth needs covering rather than filling.
Explore →Next step
The first appointment is an examination and a conversation. There is no obligation to book treatment at the end of it.