Hollywood Smile in Turkey

What a Hollywood smile is

"Hollywood smile" is not a separate dental treatment or a product. It is the name many people use for a smile makeover in Antalya, and for the look they hope it gives: teeth that are light, straight-edged and even, filling the width of the smile with no dark gaps or odd teeth. At our clinic the two are the same treatment, planned the same way, priced from the same lines of our price list and offered in the same packages. It uses the same building blocks: veneers, crowns where a tooth needs one, whitening and gum shaping.

When people use this name, they usually have the fullest version in mind: every tooth you can see, top and often bottom, changed together. The result then depends less on any one tooth and more on how the whole set suits your face. That is why this page is mostly about design and about the ways a full smile can go wrong.

It changes how your teeth look. It does not change your lips, your face shape or an unhealthy bite, and it does not make weak gums strong. Those are dealt with first.

Natural, bright or very white

People mean different things by the same words. When patients show us pictures of the smile they want, they usually fall into one of three groups:

• Natural. Teeth of a lighter natural shade, with some translucency at the edges and slight differences between teeth, so no one can tell they have been done.
• Bright. Clearly whiter and more uniform than most natural teeth, but still with depth and a lifelike shape.
• Very white. The palest shades, often lighter than any natural tooth, with very even shapes. Striking on camera, and the style most likely to look false in daylight.

All three are possible, and the choice is yours. Our job is to show you each option on your own face, in daylight, so you choose knowing how it will look across a room and not only in a photograph. Most people who see the palest shade next to their skin and eyes step back one or two shades.

"Turkey teeth" and the overdone result

"Turkey teeth" is the name the press gave to full smiles that look too white, too big and too even, and to the problems behind some of them. Our guide to Turkey teeth gone wrong covers what patients have reported. The problems usually come down to a few causes:

• Healthy teeth cut down for crowns. A crown needs the tooth reduced all the way round. On sound teeth that is a large, permanent loss, and it can lead to sensitivity, an inflamed nerve and root canal treatment. Some patients believed they were having veneers.
• Opaque, flat colour. Real teeth are slightly translucent at the edges. Teeth made in one flat, chalky shade look like a row of tiles.
• Too long, too thick, all the same. Oversized teeth can push the lip forward, and identical rectangles look manufactured.
• Rushed planning. No design stage, no try-in, and little time for the gums or the bite to be checked.

How we avoid this is set out plainly in your written plan: for each tooth, whether it gets a veneer, a crown, bonding or nothing, which material, and why. Where a tooth is healthy, we suggest a porcelain veneer rather than a crown. If you are comparing clinics, our checklist for choosing a clinic in Turkey lists the questions to ask any of them, including us.

Who it suits, and who it does not

A Hollywood smile usually suits you if

• most of the teeth that show have something you want to change: colour, shape, wear, small gaps, old mismatched crowns;
• your gums are healthy, or can be made healthy first;
• you accept that porcelain on this many teeth is a lifelong commitment, with replacements one day.

We would suggest something smaller if

• Your teeth are a good shape but dull. Teeth whitening alone may give you most of what you want, with nothing removed.
• Only a few teeth bother you. Veneers or composite bonding on those teeth, matched to the rest, is often enough.
• Your teeth are crowded. Straightening first with clear aligners can mean thinner veneers, or fewer.
• You grind heavily, or have gum disease or decay that is not under control. These come first, and the plan allows for them.

How a Hollywood smile is designed

Every full smile at Persona Smile is planned with Digital Smile Design on photographs of your face and a scan of your teeth taken with an intraoral scanner. The design works from your face inwards:

• The centre line. The gap between the two front teeth is lined up with the middle of your face, so the smile does not look skewed.
• The edges. The biting edges of the upper teeth usually follow the curve of your lower lip when you smile. Flat, straight edges are one of the signs of an overdone smile.
• Proportion. The two front teeth are usually the widest and most visible, with each tooth further back appearing a little narrower. Making them all the same size is what makes a smile look fake.
• Width. How many teeth show in your widest smile decides how far back the treatment goes. Leaving dark natural teeth at the corners is as noticeable as over-treating.
• The gum line. An uneven gum line can be evened out with gum contouring before the final scan, so the teeth sit in a tidy frame.
• Surface and edge. A little texture on the surface and slight translucency at the edge are what make porcelain read as tooth.

Where it helps, the design is turned into a trial smile placed over your own teeth without any preparation, so you can see it in a mirror, talk and smile with it before a single tooth is touched. The final teeth are milled in E-max or zirconia on CAD/CAM equipment in our in-house lab, OGN Dental Studio, and finished by hand.

How many teeth, and which treatment for each

There is no set number. The design decides it: the teeth that show in your widest smile, top and bottom. For many people that is eight or ten upper teeth and some or all of the matching lower ones, which is where the familiar figure of 16 to 20 comes from. Some need fewer; very few need more for looks alone.

Each tooth is then given the least treatment that reaches the design. A healthy tooth usually gets an E-max veneer. A tooth that is broken, heavily filled or root-treated gets a crown. A tooth that only needs a small change may be bonded, and a tooth hidden at the back of the smile may just be whitened to match. Your written plan lists every tooth with its treatment and material.

Your treatment, day by day in Antalya

Before you travel

Send us photographs in daylight: your face relaxed and smiling fully, close-ups of your teeth from the front and each side, and, if you like, a picture of a smile you admire. Add a recent X-ray if you have one. A dentist replies with a suggested treatment for each tooth and a written price. Nothing is booked until you have read it. You can send them when you book a free consultation, or on WhatsApp.

Day one: examination and design

The dentist examines your teeth, gums and bite, takes the X-rays your case needs and scans your teeth. The design is shown to you, adjusted and agreed, and you sign off the final plan: which teeth, which treatment, which material and the price.

Preparation

Whitening and gum contouring usually come first. The teeth are then prepared under local anaesthetic as the plan sets out, scanned for the lab and fitted with temporary teeth.

Try-in, fitting and before you fly

The new teeth are tried in before anything is fixed, and you judge them in daylight. Changes go back to the lab in the same building. Once you and the dentist are both happy, they are bonded or cemented, and your bite is checked again after a day or two of eating.

How many days and visits

A smile makeover is usually a single visit. For a full upper and lower Hollywood smile we usually suggest allowing about a week in Antalya, sometimes a little longer. If implants or gum surgery are part of the plan, it becomes two visits some months apart. Your written plan confirms the days and visits for your own case before you book flights. Treat these figures as typical, not promised. Our Antalya page helps with the rest of the trip.

The price

Because a Hollywood smile is a smile makeover, there is no single figure for it on our dental price list. The total depends on how many teeth are treated and with what, so it is set out tooth by tooth in your written plan once the dentist has seen your photos. The main lines are E-max veneers at €230 per tooth, E-max crowns at €190 per tooth and zirconia crowns at €170 per tooth, with laser whitening (€250, a professional clean included) and gum contouring (€50 per tooth) added where the design needs them. Where a tooth allows it, a thin E-max veneer that needs little or no reshaping is €320 per tooth.

As with any smile makeover, it is also offered as the all-inclusive Glamour Gateway and Starlight Perfection packages, described on our smile packages page. The treatment plan builder shows how a combination adds up.

Looking after a full set

Expect the teeth to feel sensitive and the bite to feel new for the first days; tell us if one tooth touches first. Back home, brush twice a day, clean between the teeth every day, and see your own dentist and hygienist for check-ups, showing them your written plan. With this many teeth in porcelain, a night guard is worth considering if you grind; our night guard for grinding is €50 on the price list. If anything chips, loosens or worries you, send us a photo on WhatsApp and a dentist will look at it.

Risks, and what can go wrong

• It is permanent. Enamel removed for veneers and crowns does not grow back, and every restoration needs replacing one day.
• Sensitivity and nerve problems. Prepared teeth can be sensitive for a while; now and then a nerve becomes inflamed and needs root canal treatment, more often under crowns than veneers.
• Chips and debonding, especially with grinding or biting hard things.
• Gum changes. Gums can recede over the years and show the edges.
• A look you tire of. A very white smile you love now may feel too much in ten years. Choosing a shade that suits your face helps it age well.

We will not promise an exact result: faces, gums and bites vary. What we can do is design first, let you see the smile on your own face, and fix nothing until you have approved the teeth in your mouth.

Who carries out your treatment

Hollywood smile cases at Persona Smile are planned by our dentists; with this many teeth changed at once, how they meet matters as much as how they look. The dentist who treats you is named in your written plan, and every dentist is on our dentists page.

Before and after pictures

We only show pictures of our own patients, with their written consent. As consented cases are added, they appear on this page and in our smile stories, never stand-in pictures of other people's smiles.

Next steps

Send us your photographs when you book a consultation, or on WhatsApp, and tell us which style you have in mind. A dentist will reply with a treatment for each tooth and a written price from our price list. You can also read more about Persona Smile, our dental clinic in Antalya, or look through all our smile treatments.