Andrea Stern is a member of one of New York’s — and the world’s — wealthiest families. Her father, Leonard Stern, expanded his own father’s pet care empire into publishing and real estate, and, according to Forbes magazine, is worth $3.7 billion.

The city where Ms. Stern was born and raised — on Fifth and Park avenues — and has made her home — on Central Park West — bears the marks of her family’s largesse. Stern College at Yeshiva University is named after her grandfather Max, a German Jew who immigrated here in the 1920s and began selling canaries. The Stern School of Business at New York University is named after her father, who joined the family business right out of college.

Now Ms. Stern has created a legacy of her own: a book of 66 photographs of her family aptly titled “Inheritance” (Monacelli Press, 160 pages, $40). Many of the subjects will gather tonight at the book party Ms. Stern’s mother, Judith Stern Peck, is holding at her home.

“Everyone says ‘You have money, you must be happy.’ I wanted to expose that, but at the same time I didn’t want it to be a poor little rich girl project. So there’s money. So what?” Ms. Stern said. The work, spanning 15 years and covering her immediate and extended family of 29 first cousins, is intimate and loving. “I was looking for moments that come from an emotional or psychological place,” Ms. Stern said. “I didn’t want to exploit or play into people’s expectations or voyeuristic desires about what it’s like to be in a wealthy family.”

The Stern family looks like other families in their backyards or at the breakfast table, at weddings and Passover Seders, dancing and praying. The family seems remarkable for its closeness and frequent large gatherings, not its material wealth.

The project began when Ms. Stern, now 40, returned from an 18-month stint in Israel, where she had moved after graduating from Brown University.

“I didn’t want to be an expat. I wanted to figure out a way to create my own identity and path within my back yard,” she said.

She began taking photographs of her family. She also studied with Nan Goldin and completed the photojournalism program at International Center of Photography. But she was unsure about making a career out of photography.

Like her two brothers, she worked for her father’s company, the Hartz Group, overseeing the interior décor of the SoHo Grand hotel and serving as publisher of the Long Island Village Voice. When she turned 30, she felt ready to devote herself full time to photography.

“It was an excruciating decision,” Ms. Stern said.

The camera turned out to be integral to her personal development. “Photographing my family was definitely a form of therapy for me. It was having an excuse to look at my family through an alternate lens,” Ms. Stern said.

Sometimes she found herself in an adversarial relationship with her relatives. “Trying to take unguarded moments of very controlling people is a difficult task,” she said.

That was especially true in the case of her father, who is not only used to control in his business life but also in his personal life, as the family photographer.

“When I was growing up, my father always had a camera, and he had very clear ideas of the shots he wanted,” Ms. Stern said. “So with him, I had to find the moment of engagement where the playing field was level. I have one shot like that in the book, when he wasn’t super self-conscious,” she said.

Asked if he wanted to be a photographer, her son, Simon, 7, said “No.” He did, however, press the button on the remote to take the photograph of himself and his mother sitting on a couch. “I don’t really like my mom taking pictures of me. Only the ones that go in the book,” he said.

Early on she had some negative feedback from her brother Manny. “He said, ‘You’re airing dirty laundry; people look sad or stricken.’ I took that to heart,” she said. “No one picture is worth a relationship. I want to respect the people I love.” In many instances the pictures in “Inheritance” transcend the actual moment when they were taken. A photograph of her mother, grandmother, and aunt communicates joy. In fact, they were teasing their photographer. “They were laughing at me. ‘Oh Andrea, there you go again,'” Ms. Stern said. “But I got the last laugh.” One shot of her mother’s husband took on new poignancy when he died suddenly two years ago: It shows him walking out of the room, brushing his hand against her mother’s shoulder.

On a Disney cruise, she didn’t see a great shot until the last night of the trip, when her brother and her sister-in-law, who was holding their sleeping daughter, stood up from their table in the dining room. Ms. Stern was sitting at the other end of the table, but she grabbed her camera and leapt over some chairs. She got two frames.

“I struggled, I worked for these moments. They are jewels that I’ve waited for and stumbled over,” Ms. Stern said.

These days, Ms. Stern regularly attends family events without her camera. “When I started, it was the only way I could enjoy these events. Today I want to be present. I’m an aunt to seven nieces and nephews. I don’t want them to know me only as a photographer.”

She has moved on from her guerrilla methods, too. Her family remains her subject, but she is working on large-format posed portraits. “The fact that my family allowed me in to do the work has made me appreciate their trust in me and their faith that I’m photographing from the heart,” Ms. Stern said.

With photographs published in the New Yorker; others exhibited in museums and galleries; a book that includes essays by Gregory Crewdson and Simon Doonan, and a show of the book’s photographs set to open September 27 at Hasted Hunt Gallery, does she feel she’s made it?

“I don’t know if you ever stop questioning yourself. Some families are just like that. I don’t think my father ever stops judging himself,” she said. “I do feel that this book does represent a personal and photographic journey, and now I can take pause and enjoy it at least for a moment.”