The Princess’s Nose

Posted on January 22, 2013 in Rhinoplasty

Of all the obsessive publicity and incessant attention surrounding Prince William and Kate Middleton, the most interesting item I’ve seen recently was about the Duchess of Cambridge’s nose. Apparently, according to the Transform Cosmetic Surgery Group, her nose was the most popular celebrity lookalike feature in the United Kingdom for 2012 (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/entertainment/2012/12/kate-middletons-nose-wins-acclaim-and-envy/). The timing is curious since only a few weeks later the unveiling of the official portrait of Kate was met with widespread disappointment (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2260655/Kate-Middleton-Rotten-official-portrait-Duchess-Cambridge-artist-Paul-Emsley-unveiled.html). To my eye, the portrait looks quite accurate in terms of facial proportions, coloring, and even expression . . . yet somehow it is not beautiful. Much more could be said on this topic, but we’ll leave that for another day.

We all know the childhood joke (“You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose . . .”), but in a rhinoplasty (nose reshaping) operation, can you really pick a celebrity’s nose? Should you pick a celebrity’s nose?! If you had to choose, Kate Middleton’s nose would be a good choice: it is straight, well-proportioned, appropriately projected and rotated, and has a nice brow-tip aesthetic. The tip is slightly bulbous, but again, it’s a great nose and most importantly it fits her face. The question you should really ask yourself, however, is would it fit my face?

I work closely with my patients to first identify the characteristics of their noses that they like. Then we discuss areas for improvement. It is very rare that someone truly, after an honest conversation and some introspection, wants a completely different nose. In the end, when people seek cosmetic or even reconstructive facial surgery, they still want to look like themselves . . . only better. After all, I think we can agree that Kate Middleton’s nose wouldn’t look that attractive on Jennifer Lopez – just like Ryan Reynolds’s nose wouldn’t do much for Sly Stallone.