Veneers are thin porcelain shells bonded over the front of a tooth. They're very good at what they do, and they're not always what you need. We'll tell you which.
Usually the smallest fix here. Bonding or light reshaping handles one chipped edge in a single visit, without touching the teeth beside it.
Try whitening before anything permanent. It costs less, it changes nothing about the tooth itself, and for a lot of people it's the whole answer.
Where veneers genuinely earn their place, though not always. A single gap often closes better with bonding, and real crowding is an orthodontic question wearing a cosmetic costume.
Bad cosmetic work has a look, and most people can spot it without being able to say why. Too white. Too even. Too long for the face it's sitting in.
Real teeth aren't uniform. The two front teeth sit slightly longer than their neighbors, edges catch the light differently, and no two are quite the same shade. Good work copies that instead of erasing it. Shade gets matched to your skin and to the teeth we're keeping, not to the brightest tab on a shade guide. Length is set against your own lip line.
If you want a result people notice, that's a fair thing to want, and we can do it. If you want one nobody can point to, say so at the consultation, because it changes the shade and shape decisions from the very first step.
The part worth being blunt about, because it's the one decision here you can't take back.
Placing porcelain means removing a thin layer of enamel, and enamel doesn't grow back.
From then on that tooth needs a veneer or a crown on it for life. Veneers get replaced eventually. They don't get taken off.
Bonding and reshaping remove far less, or nothing at all. If either one solves your problem, start there.
None of this is an argument against veneers. It's an argument for being certain first.
You say what bothers you. We check whether it's a cosmetic question at all, because decay, gum disease, or a bite problem gets treated first. Cosmetic work laid over an untreated problem doesn't last.
Porcelain doesn't respond to whitening. Whiten afterward and your natural teeth shift while the veneers stay put, so the match drifts apart. Doing it first means everything is matched to the shade you're actually keeping.
Shape and length are previewed while everything is still reversible, so you're approving a result rather than imagining one. If it's not what you pictured, this is the moment to change it.
Enamel is prepared, an impression goes to the lab, and you leave in temporaries rather than walking around with unfinished teeth. At the second visit the veneers are tried in and checked against your face before anything is permanently bonded. Bonding skips all of this and finishes in one appointment.
Two things, mostly: how many teeth are involved, and porcelain versus bonding. Bonding costs considerably less per tooth. You get the full figure in writing before anything is booked.
Purely cosmetic work usually isn't covered, and we won't pretend otherwise. Where a tooth is damaged rather than simply unattractive there may be coverage, and we check rather than assume.
See insurance & payment →Porcelain resists staining well. Bonding doesn't, and coffee and red wine will show on it in time. If you grind or clench, a night guard protects the work. Both still need ordinary brushing, flossing, and checkups.
Fewer than most people expect. Sometimes two. It depends on how much of your smile shows when you talk and laugh, not on a package size. If someone quotes you eight before looking at your smile, that's a sales number rather than a clinical one.
Preparation is done with local anesthetic and most patients compare it to having a filling. Some sensitivity to hot and cold while the temporaries are on is normal and settles. Bonding often needs no anesthetic at all.
Then we change it, which is the entire reason that step exists. Shape and length get adjusted before any enamel is prepared, and nothing's committed until you're happy with what you're looking at. Nobody should be seeing their new teeth for the first time at the end.
Tell us beforehand, not afterward. Grinding chips porcelain and wears bonding down early, so it changes what we would recommend and usually means a night guard alongside the work. It doesn't rule cosmetic treatment out, but it has to be planned around.
You won't get a reaction here, and you won't get a lecture about how it got this way. Plenty of people put this conversation off for years. Starting it is the hard part. There's more about how we handle nerves on our Nervous Patients page.
Keep exploring: All Services · Our Approach · Nervous Patients
A consultation is a conversation about options and costs, including the option of leaving things exactly as they are. Nothing gets scheduled the same day you discuss it.