About

Why this exists

Theirs & Ours began after a death in the founder’s family made something quiet obvious: the words people said about her afterwards were the words she should have heard while she was alive. We exist to make those words easier to say, at every milestone, at every age, and afterwards too.

Start a birthday book Start a memorial board Start a leaving book

The people we love don’t always know what they mean to us. We assume they know. They don’t, always.

Nobody has to be a writer. What they already know about someone is enough.

What we do, so they don’t have to

Structure, design, guidance, prompts: that’s our job. Knowing the person: that’s yours. The book reads as if everyone knew exactly what to say. We helped them know.

If you are making the book

You are not only making something for someone else. You are making something you will keep too, and the making is part of how you carry the relationship. That is as true for the daughter putting together her father’s seventieth as for the colleague organising a leaving book, or the brother gathering a book in memory of his sister. Nobody here is buying a service. You are making something, and that is part of what it is worth.

We won’t pretend the work is effortless when it isn’t. We design every step so the time you spend on it feels well spent, not like admin. The book you end up with is yours as much as it is theirs, and our job is to make the making worth it.

Who we are

Theirs & Ours was founded by someone from that family.

Replying to any email we send reaches a person, not a queue.

See inside the book How it works