Temitope Rutledge

I started this practice to be the lawyer families call before a crisis, and the one they can still reach during one.

I grew up translating forms for my grandmother, who never trusted a document she couldn't read herself. That stuck. Every plan I write has a one-page summary in plain words on top.

I spent my first years in practice at a larger firm, drafting trusts I never saw signed. Then I opened my own office on Charlotte Street so I could meet the people the papers were for. Today I take a limited number of families each month, so I can visit homes and hospitals and still pick up my own phone.

When I'm not working I'm on the Mountains-to-Sea Trail with my husband, or at my daughter's soccer games in Montford.