Hitesh and Ben have redesigned what a visit to the dentist looks like

A trip to the dentist is most likely not your favourite thing to do, it is, however, a necessary part of life to ensure your pearly whites are kept in tip-top shape. 

Understanding the anxiety that can come with visiting the dentist, owners of The Smile Factory Hitesh Gupta, Ben Van Veenendaal and Cameron White wanted to turn this anxiety upside down, instead setting out to create a relaxed, beautiful dentistry experience. 

Originally launched by Hitesh in 2015, nine years on the space was bursting at the seams, and with their client base not showing any signs of slowing, a larger location was needed. 18 months later, The Smile Factory 2.0 opened its doors on Belford St, Broadmeadow. 

The relocation marks a fresh era for the business, with The Smile Factory now redefining what a trip to the dentist looks like.

The Smile Factory owners - Hitesh Gupta and Ben Van Veenendaal

Working with Adrian De Boucherville of After Dark Design, whose work you may be familiar with: Blanca, Meet, Doughheads and the soon-to-launch Oceane Hotel to name just a few, we were keen to see the finished space.. 

The new space is just beautiful. When you first started looking to relocate, did you have a clear plan of what you wanted the new space to look like? 

We did. We knew it needed to be comfortable and not intimidating, we wanted natural colours to feature heavily, and natural light to be incorporated into the design. We needed eight rooms, and some of these needed to be bigger to cater for surgeries. 

It took us quite a while to finalise the design, and the builder. We wanted to work with local trades and builders, and I reached out to a number of designers prior to speaking with Adrian, but the results weren’t what we were looking for. Adrian understood the brief, which was that we wanted it to be less clinical and more patient-focused. 

So the desire to change the style, did that come from you or feedback from clients? 

I feel the space now reflects how we’ve always operated our practice, that being patient focused, and putting their comfort and needs first. We place a lot of importance on communicating with our patients, we take our time with them, it’s not a hustle-bustle rush to get them in and out the door. 

By creating somewhere that wasn’t intimidating, and allowing our patients to feel comfortable, this now also reflects the type of service we offer. 

Adrian’s work is beautiful, were you at all concerned that the appearance would position the practice in a certain way?  

Not really. Yes the practice looks very different, but we are still who we are, that being a family based practice that offers general dentistry services, which are for everyone. We’re still the same people, offering the same services, we’ve just modernised the look and experience, and expanded at the same time. 

Whilst we offer general dentistry services, we do also have a team of very experienced clinicians which means we can offer quite complex procedures, which aren’t offered elsewhere, so that is our point of difference. 

Another big focus for us is the sedation dentistry, which is for people that have severe anxiety. Sedation can be done in the chair, and can be offered even for regular treatments. We have specialist anesthetists that work for us and we can provide this service several times a week. 

Can you talk us through some of the stand out design features? 

This was the old Quinlan’s BBQ building, and it was very dark inside, so when we first came in, we said, "How do you make this not look black? and not look like a barbecue kitchen”. 

The oversized circular skylight in the foyer brings an abundance of natural light, and that’s what we were wanting.

I also really love the curves and how they’ve been incorporated into the design, particularly in the sterilizing room. The design of this area has really opened it up, to make it accessible and central, and has removed that clinical feel. 

The neutral colour palette is beautiful, and was a conscious decision, as to the soft furnishings which complement the overall relaxed feeling we wanted to create. 

The TVs on the ceiling of each of the surgery rooms are another new addition, together with the headphones they help you zone out and ease the anxiety. 

For most people a trip to the dentist is just an annual checkup and clean, for others it’s a life changing experience. Can you take us through the emotional aspect as to what you do?  

It's pretty cool. We do have to pinch ourselves from time to time, because we do get used to it, and we need to remind ourselves that there is such a massive human component to our job, and we’re part of the journey. 

Our patients will come in and share where they've been, and we work with them to figure out how we're going to get them the outcome they want. As a result they walk away from their treatment really happy, their partners/family are happy, and we see them change as people, they become more confident as a result of their treatment, which is pretty nice. 

Teeth are the first thing people's eyes are drawn to, so every interaction they have for the rest of their life is going to be a slightly better one, which is a pretty powerful thing to do, so a lot of satisfaction comes with our job.