Honouring your loved one as I would a friend or a member of my own family.
Allie is a specialist funeral celebrant who is dedicated to celebrating the life of those that have passed. With this single focus, Allie is truly present for you to offer comfort, support, and sensitivity at a time of grief and vulnerability.
Whether the passing of your loved one has been sudden and unexpected, or you have supported your loved one through an extended illness, the grief can be overwhelming. Allie has experienced grief first hand and has worked with many families as they embark on the same path.
At your time of grief, Allie can lead you through the myriad of options available to best honour the life of your loved one and help you say a personal, meaningful farewell.
“As a celebrant, I have been able to draw on my personal encounters with grief and my experience in Hospice to support and guide you through this difficult journey. I pride myself on being a celebrant who brings warmth and empathy to your loved ones memorial.”
- Allie
Allie’s Story
“When my mum was diagnosed with a terminal illness, the values my parents had instilled in me came sharply into focus. I chose to walk away from a successful management career to become my mother’s primary caregiver. Wanting to better understand what we were all experiencing, I completed university papers on grief and dying - valuable for the head, perhaps, but offering little preparation for the heart and what was still to come.
After Mum’s passing, I knew I could not return to the corporate world. Instead, I chose a path that better reflected my values and joined Hospice as their Planned Giving Manager. In this role, I supported a special group of donors who had chosen to leave a gift to Hospice in their Will, while also speaking with community groups and retirement villages about the importance of palliative care.
Through Hospice, I had the privilege of meeting and befriending many patients and families, some of whom asked me to help them say their final farewell. Wanting to offer the highest level of care and professionalism, I trained with the Auckland Celebrant School and became a member of the Celebrants Association of New Zealand (CANZ). What began as a natural extension of my Hospice work soon became a calling, and ultimately a new career — helping families honour a life, share a story, and create a meaningful farewell.
Today, I am in my sixth year as a celebrant, and I continue to feel deeply honoured by this work. I have built strong, trusting relationships with funeral directors and funeral homes, partnerships I value immensely. I am also happy to work alongside any funeral director chosen by a family, approaching every collaboration with respect, professionalism and care. It is a privilege to walk alongside families of all shapes, sizes and backgrounds, helping them navigate grief and sorrow while creating a meaningful and beautiful farewell for their loved one.
Outside of celebrancy, family and friendships are central to my life. I am blessed with a tight network of extraordinary long-term friends and take great joy in time spent together. I’m also a prolific reader of both fiction and non-fiction - a love nurtured by my parents. Some of my fondest childhood memories are Sunday visits to the local library, returning the week’s books, choosing the next stack, and stopping for fish and chips on the way home - simple moments that shaped a lifelong love of stories.
I also love to travel, not just for the places, but for the people and the cultures. There is little I enjoy more than sitting quietly with a coffee, watching the world go by, and appreciating the many different ways people live, love and connect across the globe.
My husband Grant and I have a blended family of four adult children and five much-loved “grandies”, with hopes for many more. We live on the North Shore and work across both the North Shore and the Hibiscus Coast - places that truly feel like home.”