Brace Yourself
6 minute read
I think I’ve missed a trick on Instagram. Instead of doggedly posting pictures of my outfits, I should have simply flashed my metal mouth brace, because apparently ‘dental influencers’ are the tastemakers of 2021. According to an article in the Business Of Fashion last month, premium oral care is the latest wellness trend du jour, as consumers contend with the after-effects of 12 months spent overanalyzing themselves from the neck up on Zoom. It’s the inevitable consequence, too, of a culture that infers that each of us should be camera-ready 24/7.
My ‘train tracks’ were fitted last October, and I had considered myself lucky that most of my dental journey was taking place behind closed doors (and a face mask) as lockdown is only beginning to lift now, eight months into my treatment. I didn’t realise, though, that I should have been creating reels and IGTV videos of my dental encounters, because braces are no longer anything to be ashamed of or embarrassed by. Today, apparently, they imbue prestige. In an interview with The Guardian in April, Dr Uchenna Okoye, who in the noughties appeared on the extreme makeover TV show 10 Years Younger and now has 12k followers on Instagram, explained that braces are becoming nothing short of “status symbols”. She revealed that: “Everyone [used to] show off their Chanel [handbag], they’re now showing their Invisalign.”
This new obsession with oral care will no doubt prove as lucrative for the dental industry as handbags have for Chanel.
In 2016, Galway dentists and sisters Lisa and Vanessa Creaven founded Spotlight Oral Care. According to the Irish Times, the company has forecast a turnover of between €40 and €50 million for this year as it enters 4,000 beauty and pharmacy retail outlets in the US. The pair confirmed to Coveteur.com that the video-call culture of the pandemic has made people more aware of their smile than they would have otherwise been. They added: “The oral care industry right now looks a lot like the skincare industry did 20 years ago...When we look at our skincare, we look for results-driven, targeted and active ingredients, and it should be the same with oral care.”
I remember watching an episode of Sex and the City in the early noughties in which 34-year-old Miranda had braces fitted, and I was in no way ‘influenced’ to investigate having dental work done then. I probably searched for a lookalike handbag or pair of shoes, however, because in my early 20s the only hardware I was interested in was the accessories kind. It’s fair to say, I’ve never been an early adopter, but my lack of interest was more likely to have been because two decades ago, we judged each other on the logos of our hand luggage and the brand names on our handbags, not on our gnashers. Today, however, an old weathered hold-all with a history has far more fashion kudos than a catwalk carry-all, while the prevailing attitude to our smiles has experienced a kind of reverse trajectory.
When I was in my 20s, everybody I knew had their own teeth. They weren’t perfect – a slightly crooked canine here and there, incisors not quite aligned – but nothing that marked anybody out. Today, though, veneers are as common as highlights.
At the dental clinic, I attend, there’s a marketing video that’s perpetually playing, showing ‘before’ and ‘after’ images of previous clients. The majority of these before images reveal what I would have considered to be great-looking teeth, yet now, anything less than pearly white, perfectly aligned incisors suggest you’re letting yourself go. The standards of the day have dramatically changed.
Bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell once said: “The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend or social behaviour crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire.” Oral care appears to have reached its tipping point.
Along with the rebranding of dental to oral care, and the slick range of bespoke products that define it (they’ll tackle everything from teeth whitening to enamel thinning), the industry has also had a smart makeover, with modern dental clinics feeling more like chic, customer-service focused salons, and Instagram-worthy packaging the order of the day (check out Kendall Jenner’s Moon teeth whitening pen and vegan toothpaste Better & Better).
There’s a part of me inclined to interpret this new trend as just another method of manipulating women into feeling they need to ‘fix’ something about themselves to be ‘good enough’. We all know there’s a fortune to be made from female insecurity, and I say this as someone who has handed over more than €5,000 for the reassurance of having teeth that look like everybody else’s. It’s ironic, because I feel I’ve spent most of my 40s understanding and accepting that trying to be ‘perfect’ is a fool’s errand. Perfection simply equates to generic; character and individuality are what count. One of my favourite lines from Naomi Wolf’s The Beauty Myth – an incredible book – is: “She wins who calls herself beautiful and challenges the world to change to truly see her.”
Yet, I still want beautiful teeth. Of course, everything is on a continuum, and my philosophy, rightly or wrongly, is that good teeth and hair are the foundations for ageing well. I’d add skin to that list only mine has a will entirely of its own and can, at best, be managed. So I plan to rely on the thick head of hair I was lucky enough to inherit from my mother, and the teeth I’m putting my hand in my pocket for. They’ll prop up the fine lines and tired eyes, thinning lips and sagging skin, which will arrive in the decades to come, and which I want to accept with good grace rather than with fear and loathing.
This is just part of my midlife re-evaluation I suppose. How do I move through my middle years and beyond with confidence and authenticity?
I think of this oral care industry as more of a movement, because really it’s about much more than just aesthetics. There’s substance behind the style. From bamboo toothbrushes to biodegradable floss, brands are exploring how to incorporate sustainability, veganism and environmentalism into their ethos and practices. Moreover, the New York Times explained in an article this month the extent to which oral care is inextricable from an individual’s physical, emotional and psychological wellbeing. “Gum disease has been linked to a wide variety of disorders, including diabetes, Altzheimer’s disease, cardiovascular disease, premature birth and even respiratory infections.”
My journey may have been about aesthetics, to begin with, but monthly dental visits and 6-monthly hygienist appointments are my new normal (I was shockingly lax about both before), as is the electric toothbrush I swapped my plastic supermarket buy for last year. Improving the appearance of my smile has forced me to focus on the health of my mouth too. I guess wellness will always be a combination of looking after our interior and exterior. Focusing on one to the detriment of the other will only ever put you at the wrong end of that continuum.
Marie Kelly, May 2021
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