Nose Aesthetics

A nose is never judged on its own. It sits between the eyes and the mouth, and the eye reads it in relation to the brow, the cheeks, the lips and the chin. This is why any consultation with Dr. Teker begins with analysis, before any talk of surgery: what your face needs, and what change would bring the nose into balance with the rest of it.

Nose aesthetics is the name for that analysis and for the aesthetic side of rhinoplasty. It draws on proportions that surgeons have measured for a century, on the individual anatomy of your skin and cartilage, and on taste. The measurements set the limits; taste decides what to do within them.

What the eye reads

• The profile. The line from the brow to the tip, called the dorsum, is the most noticed feature of the nose. A hump interrupts it; an over-scooped bridge makes a face look operated. Most people read a straight or very slightly curved line as natural.
• The angles. The angle between the forehead and the nose, and the angle between the nose and the upper lip, decide whether a nose looks long, short, lifted or drooping. There are comfortable ranges for each, slightly different for men and women.
• Tip projection and rotation. How far the tip stands out from the face, and whether it points slightly up or down, changes the character of the whole profile.
• Width. From the front, the bridge, the tip and the nostril base each have a width that relates to the distance between the eyes. When one of them is out of step, the nose looks heavy or pinched.
• Facial thirds. The face divides roughly into three: hairline to brow, brow to the base of the nose, and nose to chin. A nose that is too long or too short shifts that balance.

What can change

Almost everything above can be adjusted: a hump lowered, a tip lifted or de-rotated, the bridge narrowed, the nostrils reduced, the length shortened. What limits the change is your tissue. Thick skin hides fine definition and swells for longer; weak cartilage needs support before it can be reshaped. Dr. Teker examines both at the consultation and tells you plainly which changes are realistic and which are not.

Natural results

The best compliment after rhinoplasty is that nobody notices. Dr. Teker avoids over-reduction, keeps the proportions of your ethnicity and sex, and plans a nose that will still suit you in twenty years. Fashion in noses changes; a face in balance does not.

If you are not sure what bothers you about your nose, that is a good reason to come. Many patients arrive thinking their problem is the hump and leave understanding that a slightly lifted tip is what they were really seeing.