The photos, the voices, and the stories behind them, kept for your family, and no one else.
A free app for your phone, in final testing on iPhone and Android.
Setting up a Hearth, or using a computer? Open the web version
No ads, no algorithms, no strangers, and nothing to sign up for.
A voice. A face. A gesture. A few plain words. We believe they hold more power than we tend to notice: the power to connect, and to reconnect; to teach; to remember, and to reminisce. That belief is the whole reason for Shadetree: a quiet place to keep them, for the people they're meant for.
Two of our own: real memories, kept in our family's Shadetree the same way you'd keep yours. Have a listen, if you can spare thirty seconds.
This is the man Shadetree is named after. I had just asked him what his favorite tree was. He used to walk us grandchildren out and teach us to name trees by their leaves and their bark. I have lost the skill. I still have his voice.
Fifteen seconds of somebody with a great deal to say and nothing yet to say it with. Complete nonsense, delivered with absolute conviction.
Nothing important is said on either recording. One sat on a tape in a box; the other under a meaningless filename in a backup folder. That is exactly the kind of thing Shadetree is for.
Somewhere along the way, “sharing” stopped meaning what it used to. Feeds and followers. Likes and outrage. Performing for strangers. It’s exhausting, and it pulls us apart.
Shadetree is none of that. No feed. No likes. No strangers. No performing. Just your family, and the moments that matter to them.
Tell the story behind an old photograph. Record your voice, or catch someone’s face the moment they hear good news. Keep the little, ordinary things that make your family yours - and share them only with the people you choose. No one else can open them. Not even us.
Or have grandma teach you to bake that cake. It’ll be a living recipe, not some words on a piece of card stock.
The everyday part, on any phone. Capture a memory and share it privately with your family in a couple of taps: the story, the photo, the voice behind it.
The always-on part, on a small screen at home. Set a spare tablet on the mantel and your family's memories glow there through the day: the photos, the faces, the voices, quietly cycling. A warm place they live, not a folder you have to open.
Every memory is locked so only your family can open it. We can’t read them, and we wouldn’t want to.
Export a complete copy any time. It belongs to you, and stays yours even if we disappear.
Invitation only. No strangers, no suggestions, no algorithm deciding what you see.
No ads, no tracking, and no company keeping a copy of your life to study or sell. Your memories are locked so that even we can’t read them, so there’s nothing here worth selling to anyone.
Nothing today. There are no ads and there never will be, and nothing you save is scanned or sold.
That isn’t a promise about good behaviour. It’s a fact about how it’s built: your memories are locked on your phone before they ever leave it, so there is nothing here for anyone to read. Including me.
Shadetree runs on a small server I pay for each month. One day there may be things you can buy: a printed book of a year, a Hearth for the mantel, perhaps a feature or two. Those will always be optional, with the price in plain sight. What I won’t do is sell your attention, or put the memories you have already saved behind a paywall.
BrianCreator of Shadetree
Not the polished, posed ones. A grandmother explaining who’s in an old picture. A grandchild’s first look at good news. A voice saying your name the way only they say it.
A place to celebrate, remember, learn, reconnect, and grow together.
To hear a voice you love, whenever you want to. To know where you come from. To hold onto each other.
In final testing on iPhone. Free, and nothing to sign up for.