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Paper Anniversary Gift

Examples

Before you scroll

These are real maps. No two are alike, because no two stories are, some are sparse and doodle-like, others dense with architecture. Both are the same style; the difference is how much detail the brief carried. Click any map to read it full size, which is the only way to see the named pubs, campuses and houses that make each one specific.

Real maps

Made for real couples

Ordered roughly from the shortest story to the longest. Every one was made to a brief written by the person giving it.

What they look like printed

Framed, in situ, and up close

Printed at 30 × 45 cm and 50 × 75 cm, in black and oak frames.

  • Two hands holding a black-framed custom love map print titled Our Love Map for Alex and Jordan. The black and white illustration shows a winding road through mountains, cabins and pine trees, marking dates including their first date and engagement.

    Printed at 30 × 45 cm in a thin black frame.

  • A vertical custom love map print in a light oak frame hanging on a neutral wall in afternoon light. The minimalist line art illustrates a couple’s journey from meeting in Boulder to building a home in Montana.

    Oak frame, soft daylight, the most requested styling.

  • A spacious living room with a large wooden-framed custom love map above a beige sofa. The personalised artwork shows a relationship timeline with illustrations of city landmarks including the Eiffel Tower and a New York apartment.

    At 50 × 75 cm the smallest labels stay easy to read.

  • An iPad on a wooden desk displaying the high-resolution digital file of a custom love map for Chloe and Tom, with milestones in Bondi Beach, London, Rome and Santorini. An Apple Pencil and a coffee cup sit beside it.

    You receive the file itself, print it at any 2:3 size, as many times as you like.

  • Close-up macro photograph showing the paper grain and ink detail of a printed custom love map. The illustration features a sketched camper van beside mountains with the text Van Life 2019.

    Detail at 300 DPI on matte art paper.

  • Ink-line style black and white icon set representing relationship milestones: a diamond ring for an engagement, a tiered cake for a wedding, a pram for a baby, a paw print for pets, an aeroplane for travel and a house for moving in together.

    A few of the milestone illustrations. Yours are drawn to match your story.

  • A bedroom with a wooden bed and white linen. Above the headboard hang two framed prints: a detailed custom love map on the left and a simple botanical olive branch drawing on the right.

    Paired with a simple botanical print in a gallery wall.

  • A neutral living room with an olive tree in a pot and a custom love map in a light wood frame hanging above a white sofa with linen cushions.
  • A custom love map in a light wood frame on a white wall beside a large window, above a cream sofa with a jute rug and a rustic wooden coffee table.
  • A custom love map in a natural wood frame hanging above a beige sofa, with dried pampas grass in a ceramic vase on a reclaimed wood coffee table.
  • Four images of the same custom love map: framed in oak on a plain wall, hanging in a sunlit living room, a close-up of the Lake Tahoe and Montana section, and framed above a bed in a bright bedroom.

    One map, four rooms.

  • Three simple sketch icons explaining the order process: a shopping cart labelled Order, a heart speech bubble labelled Send Story, and an envelope with a download arrow labelled Get Files.

Reading the examples

What the good ones have in common

The maps people love most are not the ones with the best holidays on them. They are the ones where the small, specific things made it onto the paper: one particular pizza takeaway, a log-delivery lorry with a Christmas hat on it, a cat called Neil, a first Thanksgiving, a bench with two initials carved into it, a bone tag on a pick-up truck.

Notice how often the strongest stop is unglamorous. Meghan and Francis got engaged in the same coffee shop as their first date. Matt and Corey put hosting Thanksgiving on theirs. Jon and Terrie labelled a stop first re-date, which tells you more about them than a holiday would.

That is a brief question rather than a drawing question. The difference between a generic map and a specific one is whether the brief named the places and said what made them distinctive, which is entirely within your control before you order.

Milestone ideas to borrow → · how many to choose → · what 24 couples chose →

The heading

The title is yours to choose too

The words lettered across the top are not fixed. Across the maps above they read Our First Year, Our Love Map, The Story of Us, and one delivered map is lettered entirely in German as Unsere Liebeskarte. Send the heading you want with your brief.

To be continued

Start your love map

Send your names and five to eight milestones on Etsy. A draft comes back within 3 days, and you approve it before the final files are sent.

Digital download · 4–5 days · no shipping