In this era of “selfies,” where seemingly everyone has a camera phone and can take and post pictures of themselves, we’ve become an image-conscious society for sure. By the way, the term image-conscious is best defined as being concerned about the way one comes across to other people and the impression one creates. We all want to be good looking, ideally.

At Crowley Family Dental, we do cosmetic restorations, which is a fancy way of saying we do things to your teeth to make them look great, and, in turn, help you look and feel your best.

Cosmetic restorations are artistic and aesthetic in nature. They’re done to improve the appearance of teeth and to ultimately make smiles look better, brighter and confident. It’s not just about making teeth function the right way– it’s about making them beautiful, too.

Besides things like teeth whitening, when it comes to improving the look of teeth there are several things that can be done. For instance, have you heard of composite bonding? This is where tooth-colored composite resin is attached to teeth to improve the shape/look. Then there are porcelain or composite veneers, which are hard but thin shells of tooth-colored material placed over “dental imperfections” such as stained teeth. Crowns and bridges fall under the category of cosmetic restorations, too. Ever heard of tooth shaving? Perhaps your teeth are round at the bottom but you want the edges to be angled lines– teeth can be shaved to match the look you’re going for. Maybe shaving isn’t the right term– it sounds better to say “tooth contouring and reshaping.”

Even something as simple as tooth-colored fillings are the norm nowadays. A couple decades back, people who had cavity fillings would open their mouth and flash a lot of silver metal at people… but now, thanks to modern advances in dentistry, you can have cavities filled such that onlookers wouldn’t even know you’ve had a filling– nice!