Perfect teeth — as designed by Nasa

Dr Anthony Lam is to dental-phobes what bacon is to vegetarians: he makes you want to convert.

Looking back over a year of treatment for a whizzy new brace made from metal designed by Nasa engineers, I don’t think of the dietary restrictions, the discomfort or the time one of the wires pinged out of my mouth in the middle of a posh dinner date. I think of Lam’s smiling face.

Born and brought up in Mauritius before settling in Marylebone with his wife and two sons, the practice where Lam works, Elleven, is about as far removed from the grotty NHS dentists I had been used to as is possible to get.

Set in a Grade II-listed Victorian house within the Howard de Walden estate in Devonshire Place, Elleven looks more like a spa than a dental surgery.

“We firmly believe in treating patients as individuals,” says Elleven’s clinical director Sameer Patel, “so we don’t just put veneers into everyone’s mouths, like some dentists. We take the time to go through a patient’s history and see if there are better solutions.”

Lam and Dr Shivani Patel, a consultant orthodontist, are attracting not just industry accolades but also a celebrity following. Actress Emma Watson and former England rugby captain Lewis Moody are patients. Many more come incognito for the SureSmile brace as Elleven is the only practice in London licensed to fit it.

SureSmile was devised in the US using wire perfected by Nasa for use on its space equipment. Cut by robots according to precision 3-D images of my teeth, the wire is designed to have 100 per cent shape memory. Unlike traditional braces that eventually slacken, SureSmile is the brace that keeps on pulling. This is sometimes uncomfortable, and crunchy food is out of the question in the first few weeks, but the technique cuts treatment times by more than a third compared with conventional braces.

In fact, Lam says he oftens treats brides and bridegrooms-to-be wanting perfect teeth within a year — and achieving it. “People often come and get a brace fitted in advance of a big occasion,” he says.

Having a SureSmile brace can improve much more than just your teeth. Looking at before and after photos with Sameer, it is clear to see the improvement in the jawline and cheekbone shape of many of the patients.

“We take the face as a whole into consideration when planning the shape of the SureSmile brace. Some people may have a protruding jaw line. This is something we can try to improve.”

I was the typical product of Seventies dentistry that dictated I spent years having teeth pulled out and wearing braces, only to emerge in my teens with two protruding front teeth. I hated the way they cast a shadow on the neighbouring molars and, as a consequence, I developed what Lam calls a “closed mouth smile”. It’s quite common in London, my friend Julian from New York tells me — beaming from ear to ear.

But one year on, I beam too — proud of my perfectly straight teeth which, now that they’ve emerged from the shadows, look surprisingly white.