I Prefer Paris: Le Chic Dentiste

December 27, 2006

Le Chic Dentiste

My dentist, Stéphane Brun, is good looking, charming, stylish, an artisan, and a perfectionist.

His office in an unassuming small building, located on rue Pierre Lescot next door to Joe Allens, is more an art gallery and mid-century modern furniture exhibit than a dentist's office. When you walk in, his lovely assistant greets you, takes your coat, and escorts you to the waiting room. She closes the door and you are left in a room ready to be on the cover of Elle Décor, filled with Bertoia chairs, a Frank Lloyd Wright-esque fireplace, a Mies Van de Rohe black leather club chair, and a dramatic torpedo-like light sculpture hanging from the ceiling all against warm teal blue green walls. There are stacks of the latest art and design magazines and I arrive early, so I can read all of my favorites that I am too frugal to buy.

After testing out all the chairs and catching up on the art & design dish, Stephen is ready for me and I go into his state of the art office with large computer screens, a Mac, and a futuristic purple and white dentist chaise right out of the Jetsons.I slid into the chaise and he worked on my two root canals, one extra large filling, and two caps. He took X-rays of my battered teeth, which instantly appear on the screen in front of me, and he also has a cool device that looks like a pen but is a video camera that gives you a tour of the inside of your mouth. For all of his gadgets, he is an expert craftsman and I have never been to a dentist who was so thorough, as he worked tirelessly for hours making sure everything was perfect. It’s like having an artist work on your mouth. To make you feel at ease, he has a jazz radio station on, so Ella, Miles, Sarah, and Louis are serenading you and drowning out the drilling. When we are finished, we go into his office and he sits behind his white 70’s hard plastic desk and we talk. He is warm and charming and I find out that he is also an art collector. He then shakes my hand, escorts me to the door and says “A'bientot!”