How long does it take to write a personalised book?

From a few hours to a few days. Each person has their own style and, consequently, their own writing schedule. This is why we have created flexible questionnaires with narrative capsules that are easily adapted to everyone’s needs. In each questionnaire, there are between 30 and 50 narrative capsules that can be freely combined –you don’t have to answer all of them. Based on the experience of our customers, we can safely say that the time needed to write a book with Book-à-Porter can vary between a few hours and a few weeks.

How long does it take to make a personalised book?

30 working days. Our editorial process includes three basic steps: 1. Revision of the text. This includes meticulous proofreading of the drafts with correction of any typos; 2. Layout. This phase involves creating the layout of the text; and 3. Printing. The three phases of our editorial process, which is carried out with artisanal care, require approximately 10 days for each phase. For this reason, the delivery time for our personalised books is 30 working days.

Bypassing time obstacle 1 – the Gift Card

Buy a gift card. In order to guarantee the quality of our publications, we cannot reduce our production times. However, if you are in love with the idea of ​​writing a book with Book-à-Porter, perhaps for an important gift, but you feel you don’t have the time necessary to do it, a Gift Card can be a great option. You can find out more about our Gift Cards below or in the Gift Cards section.

Bypassing time obstacle 2 – the “Save a memory” box

If you truly don’t have time to write an entire book, you might consider the idea of ​​condensing everything you want to say in a few lines. This is the solution offered by our original gift box set known as “Save a Memory”. In this gift box, you will find guided reflections that will help you capture the “spark of memory”. With this option, you can give a very personal version of a shared memory and make it a unique, special, completely original gift.

Who writes the story?

You write the story, together with the people you want to involve in the project*. Our editorial team will modify the text only when it comes to spelling and punctuation. In fact, only typos will be corrected in the original text –no one will change your style or words– they will be left intact and printed in the book without alteration.

*Books written by numerous people. Some of the books such as YOU and WE can become a chorus of narratives, if necessary. When more people are involved in writing one of our reserved books, they become even more special. This is why we encourage you to consider this option. In these cases, we provide the materials to make the process clear and simple for everyone.

How do you write a tailor-made book?

Once the order is confirmed, you will receive all the material and information necessary by email in order for you to write your own book. Moreover, you can rely on our support at any time. Just contact us by email or WhatsApp.

Every story deserves to be told in an authentic way, and even more so if you are the protagonist. For that reason, our advice is this: try to be yourself 100% while you write, without any screening. Let the narrative energy flow through you, and you will see how easy it is.

How do I modify my order?

Once the final version of the text has been sent to the Book-à-Porter editorial team, it will no longer be possible to change the content of the book. However, if you want to request a last-minute change to your order, you must contact Customer Service as soon as possible at hello@book-a-porter.com. Please note that if 5 (five) working days have passed from the moment a text is sent, it will no longer be possible to make any changes.

Editorial process

The first step of the editorial process is proofreading. Once you submit your stories through the online questionnaires, the Book-à-Porter editorial team will submit the texts for a thorough review. Please don’t be alarmed by this word. As we mentioned earlier, only typos and misspellings will be deleted and/or corrected. Under no circumstances will your words be changed –we will only intervene in the case of typos and minor errors in order to allow your style to shine!

Once the text is submitted to this labor limae (means polishing, but it sounds better in Latin, don’t you think?), in order to make it impeccable, the publishing process continues with the layout and printing phases. At this stage, a professional graphic designer takes charge of shaping your stories, or in other words, inserting your words into the structure of the book.

When this phase is finished, the book goes through an additional revision to make sure everything is perfect.

At this point, the book is finally sent to be printed. One final review is made to check that there is not a single drop of ink out of place and that your Book-à-Porter is ready to be packaged and shipped.

What if I want a 100% personalised book?

In our Haute Couture section, we offer an exclusive service in which we create books side-by-side with our clients that are entirely tailor-made. The Book-à-Porter Haute Couture experience offers our customers the opportunity to choose and customise the form in which the story is told, as well as the delivery format. For more information, see our Haute Couture page. This service is subject to availability.

Format

Why are the books created by Book-à-Porter mostly available in print format? It’s not because we love the smell of paper. The reason we decided to entrust your stories to the traditional paper format, so sturdy and reassuring, is more profound. Our mission is to rescue peoples’ memories from the relentless digital flow that characterizes many other aspects of our lives. To do this, paper seems like the most suitable medium. Thus, with their refined editions, books created by Book-à-Porter give reading a pleasant break from the incessant digital noise in our surroundings.

eBooks

The eBooks offered by Book-à-Porter can only be purchased together with the paper edition of our books. The reason it cannot be purchased individually has to do with the philosophy of our product [link] –we consider paper, and specifically our refined editions, to be the most suitable medium for housing such important stories. Therefore, the digital version is merely an accessory of the paper book. Flexible and transferable to all your tech devices, it is the best companion of the Book-à-Porter paper editions.

And don’t worry if you’re not tech savvy. Instructions on how to read in digital format will be provided by email as soon as we ship the printed books.

Packaging

Books produced by Book-à-Porter come in sophisticated cardboard boxes covered with soft, Gmund-Coloured Matte paper. These elegant boxes, with the Book-à-Porter logo in the centre and decorated with an organic cotton bow, contain books that are wrapped in tissue paper as well. Each book contains a surprise that we invite our customers not to reveal. Unwrapping a book created by Book-à-Porter is truly a unique experience.

For more information, please refer to the “Terms and Conditions” section [link].

The confidentiality, privacy, and security of our customers’ data is our highest priority. Our privacy policy is provided in compliance with a new law, which is EU Regulation 2016/679 – (GDPR). The GDPR’s primary goal is to enhance individuals’ control and rights over their personal data.

What is personal data?

The term “personal data” is defined by law and refers to “any information related to an identified or identifiable natural person (data subject). An identifiable natural person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, especially with regard to an identifier such as a name, identification number, location data, or online identifier”.

The very nature of the service offered by Book-à-Porter implies that most of the information offered by our customers for the purpose of filling their orders falls into this category: photos, personal stories, anecdotes, etc. For the sake of clarity, we make a distinction between the following aspects of personal data:

• Proper personal data = that which is defined by law
• Your stories = personal data related to your own stories that are compiled in the books created by Book-à-Porter

We explain below how these two different sets of personal data are processed.

Personal Data

This information is collected for two main reasons: a) to complete the online purchase process; and b) to fill your order. Customer data is shared with third parties only if it is required to fill your order. This is the case, for example, with service providers we hire such as transport companies, payment service operators, and banks. These third parties receive only the data that is absolutely necessary for filling your order.

Your stories

The content of the books in the form of the responses given in the narrative capsules within the questionnaires of books by Book-à-Porter will be treated with the utmost confidentiality. Team members of Book-à-Porter who are in charge of correcting and laying out the drafts, as well as the printing, have no access to the personal data of the client who sends a text. In other words, for further protection of each client’s privacy, team members only process anonymous stories and have no access to a client’s complete file. Therefore, members of the team have no knowledge of the first and last names, email addresses, ages, etc., of clients. Moreover, all Book-à-Porter employees are required to sign confidentiality agreements with the Data Controller. For more information about this issue, please consult our Privacy Policy.

What’s next?

Once the order is delivered, we offer our customers two options with regard to their stories:

• “Burn after reading” For those who do not want to leave their stories in our archives, we offer the possibility of completely deleting the content of their books and any other material that was provided to complete the story
• “To be continued…” For those who may want to expand their stories in the future or use some of the fragments to create other books through Book-à-Porter, storage is offered by Book-à-Porter (by keeping the texts in our archives) for a maximum period of 5 years.

For questions regarding our site, or to contact the privacy protection representative, feel free to send an email to the following address: privacy@book-a-porter.com

Those lucky enough to receive a Book-à-Porter Gift Card will have the opportunity to write a book about their own life. Packaged with care in our own elegant gift boxes, these are small, miniature books containing useful instructions on how to activate the writing process. To make this gift even more touching, you can add a personalized message printed inside.

You can purchase a Book-à-Porter Gift Card by clicking on “Gift Card” in the Special Gifts section. You will be redirected to a new page, where you can choose the type of story you want to give as a present: biography (ME), family history (WE), the story of a special person (YOU), of your partner (YOURS), or the story of a romantic relationship (YOU&ME). At this point, you can add your personalized message.

(Note: Terms and Conditions of www.book-a-porter.com apply to the purchase and use of Gift Cards).

All payments on the Book-à-Porter website are invoiced in Euros (EUR). All prices include VAT. In our atelier, you can pay with an easy 50%-50% payment plan: you pay an initial 50% deposit, and then pay the remaining 50% of the price of the book once the texts have been written, and before the publishing process begins. Payments can be made by PayPal or bank transfer.

For the purchase of gift cards and the “Save a Memory” box, the full amount must be paid in a single payment through PayPal, bank transfer, credit card or debit card.

PAYMENT METHODS

Credit or debit cards:

Book-à-Porter uses the SSL protection system in order to prevent credit card data from being intercepted or manipulated. Such security procedures have been developed exclusively for these types of credit cards in order to verify that the buyer is actually the legitimate holder of the credit card and that the online seller can legitimately carry out the transaction.

Wire transfer

Upon submitting your order, please transfer the entire amount to the following account, indicating the order number:

Valentina Morotti (Book-à-Porter)

IBAN ES23 1465 0120 3917 2617 2521

SWIFT-BIC: INGDESMMXXX

Bank transfer costs and bank fees are charged to the customer.

Your order will be shipped upon receipt of payment to our account.

PayPal

Please select “PayPal” as your payment method and you will be transferred to the PayPal site automatically. If you have an existing PayPal account, you can log in with your user data to confirm payment. If you do not have a PayPal account, you can easily register with this service and proceed with the payment.

Shipping methods

Our transport provider is UPS Standard Service. All deliveries are insured against theft and damage from accidents. The coverage is terminated once the delivery is confirmed by the customer’s signature.

Orders are processed and shipped during our working hours: Monday – Friday from 10:00 to 19:00 CET and Saturday from 9:00 to 15:00 CET (except public holidays in Spain). The goods will be ready for shipment within one month (30 working days) from the final payment.

Costs and delivery times

For orders over € 500, shipping is free. Shipping methods for each country, as well as prices and delivery times, can be seen in the following chart:

Personal data is transferred in encrypted form using advanced digital security systems.

SSL technology

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) allows sensitive information such as credit card numbers, social security numbers, and login credentials to be transmitted safely. SSL is a standard security technology for establishing an encrypted link between a server and a client – typically a web server (website) and a browser, or a mail server and a mail client.

By subscribing to our newsletter, you give your consent to Book-à-Porter to use your data for the purpose of sending information about content or products you have selected. The aforementioned statement of consent can be revoked with future effect at any time, in writing, at the following email: hello@book-a-porter.com. Newsletter subscriptions can also be cancelled by clicking on the appropriate link at the bottom of each newsletter. Customer data is provided to our suppliers exclusively for administrative and hosting purposes only.

If you have any problem, doubt, question, special request, or any other “etcetera”, please write to us and we will do our best to work with you in finding a solution. You can write to us at the following email address: hello@book-a-porter.com.