The Fundamentals of Beauty

You look at someone. You say, “She’s beautiful.” “He’s handsome.” Is this beauty just in the eyes of the beholder? Well, to some degree, the answer may be yes, but there are defined proportions that we can use to predict and determine beauty. Yes, beauty can be measured.  And yes, that is physical beauty. Inner beauty is something else.

I’ll leave the entire face to the plastic surgeons. Let’s talk about dental beauty, the smile.

Here are the areas that the dentist uses to help establish, or reestablish, the beautiful smile.

  1. The “Golden Proportion” The smile can be measured by relative tooth size. When we look at our patients, or when you look at someone else, the width of one tooth to the next is critical. As you look at this picture, notice the relative widths from central incisor, to lateral incisor, to canine.  Note that these widths are not the actual widths. They are the visual widths, the width that another sees when looking at you directly.
  1. The Smile line.  The smile line of the upper teeth should correlate and be relatively parallel with the lower lip line when smiling.
  1. The Buccal Corridor—Buccal means “cheek.”  The corridor is the area between the back teeth and the corner of the lip.  We want the buccal corridor to be filled with teeth rather than having a black space in that area.

Your dentist works very hard not only to restore your teeth. Now you know what else he or she looks at to maximize the beauty and impact of your smile.