A new dental boutique cut the ribbon in Marina del Rey this week, capping a six-year journey for its founder that began with an idea in 2020 and ended with a storefront she didn't find until late 2022. White Haus Dental & Aesthetics now offers general, restorative and cosmetic dentistry for adults, built around what its founder calls a personal approach that blends oral health, function and smile aesthetics.
The practice belongs to Dr. April Buckins, DDS, MBA, who founded White Haus and brings more than a decade of clinical experience to the chair, according to the Los Angeles Sentinel. “We started this project in 2020, I started looking for property and I think I found it around late 2022,” Buckins said. The newspaper describes White Haus as a Black woman-owned dentistry boutique and reports that Buckins earned her Doctor of Dental Surgery degree from Loma Linda University School of Dentistry and holds a Master of Business Administration.
A Ribbon-Cutting With Family and Chamber Officials
The grand-opening ceremony drew family, friends and colleagues, with a photo caption from the article identifying Buckins cutting the ribbon alongside them. Chad Maender, president and CEO of the LAX Coastal Chamber of Commerce, presented Buckins with a proclamation as the chamber welcomed White Haus into the Marina del Rey business community, per the same account.
Also on hand were people central to Buckins's circle and staff. Joy Richardson, a pediatric dentist described as Buckins's lifetime friend who attended dental school alongside her, was there, as were Moriah Smith, who works at White Haus as a dental assistant, and Jasmine Younger, the practice's treatment coordinator. Kenneth Bowman, identified in the report as Buckins's significant other and partner, rounded out the celebration.
Veneers, Aligners and a Rocky Buildout
Beyond the ribbon-cutting, Buckins has detailed what the practice actually specializes in and what it took to get there. In an interview with Voyage LA, she said, “We specialize in veneers, whitening, clear aligners, and smile design,” on top of comprehensive general dentistry. Buckins told the outlet that construction delays, unexpected costs, city permits and contractor issues all complicated the buildout before White Haus could finally open its doors.
That friction tracks with the yearslong gap between when Buckins began looking for property in 2020 and when she actually found the space in late 2022, a timeline laid out in the Sentinel's reporting. Her focus throughout, the paper notes, has been on comprehensive treatment planning and delivering what she describes as innovative, personalized dental care.
A Rare Opening in a Narrow Field
White Haus's launch lands against a backdrop that workforce researchers have tracked for years. The ADA Health Policy Institute has found that Black and Hispanic dentists remain significantly underrepresented in the U.S. dentist workforce, while Asian dentists are significantly overrepresented. The institute also notes that even as the profession has diversified overall, “the share of dentists who are Black, for example, has not changed at all,” with virtually all of the broader diversification driven by growth in the number of Asian dentists.
The same ADA research points to a related pattern in access to care: Black dentists are more likely than White dentists to participate in Medicaid, all else equal. Separately, a study referenced on PubMed found that among Black dentists in its weighted sample, 76.6 percent self-identified as African-American, 13.2 percent as African and 10.3 percent as Afro-Caribbean. None of that data speaks directly to White Haus, but it frames just how uncommon a practice like Buckins's remains nationally.
For now, White Haus stands as a finished product after a long runway, a boutique in Marina del Rey built around veneers, aligners, smile design and the kind of comprehensive dentistry Buckins says she set out to offer when she first sketched the idea back in 2020.
