What’s in a coffin?
At Musgrove Willow you can go and watch the coffin being made — and even lend a hand. There’s a big coffin show on at Chiltern Woodland Burial Park this weekend. I can’t make it, sad to say. If you can, it looks good. And Chiltern is a lovely place. Coffins are what visitors to […]
Test drive it first…
Here’s an intelligent, beautifully written piece from Salon magazine in which the writer describes the consequences of his father’s final request No. 5: “My body is to be placed in a plain pine box. I would like my children to make the box.” In his last years my father, the writer William Manchester, told me, […]
The Sunset coffin
“Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.” There’s a funeral industry variant on this saying. Substitute ‘coffin’ for ‘mousetrap’. Last week I went to see Sunset Coffins. Its development is the outcome of a partnership between an environmentally conscious funeral director and ironmonger, Jeremy Clutterbuck, and an engineer, […]
Funeralcare screwupdate, with added overpricing
It is with a heavy-hearted sense of duty that I record this beastly and deplorable allegation against Co-operative Funeralcare. You can find the full version at MoneySavingExpert.com. Don’t use co-operative funeralcare directors they are disgusting …They failed to complete the legal documents correctly they put the wrong funeral date on the documents … We were […]
What are we missing?!
The availability of personalization features that reflect and honor individual lifestyles … life symbols designs add a distinct touch to the casket … embroidered tribute panels … the Memory®Safe Drawer encourages family to participate … important for expressing your loved one’s individuality … many times a particular species of wood may evoke an important memory […]
Boxing clever
Interesting, isn’t it – or is it – that coffins, after all this time, still look like nothing else, unless it’s other coffins? New materials – willow, seagrass, you name it – are easier on the eye, they don’t reflect the repellent glint of a winter sky, but there’s no mistaking what they’re for. We’ve […]
Final turn of the screw
Here’s a bit of fun, for which I thank my excellent friend Tony Piper. It’s a self-boring coffin, hermetically sealed, with built-in flower and flag receptacle. Two people can (er, theoretically) screw it into place like a capstan. It was patented in 2007, since when there seems to have been little uptake (wrong noun, surely?). […]
Buy a box and make it better
I love this mission statement from Batesville, the big boy of US box manufacturers—the corp which coffined Michael Jackson: “At Batesville Casket Company, our mission is to assist funeral homes in creating meaningful funerals that help families honor the lives of those they love. We do this by providing superior funeral products and services that […]
Bookcase coffin
I know I’ve blogged about this before. I’m doing so again because William Warren, the ingenious designer of these handsome shelves which can be reassembled as a coffin is now offering free instructions so that you can make your own. Simply email him your height and build and you’ll be able to construct something bespoke […]
Best in show 3
I wonder what people who visit graves think their loved one looks like now—or whether they think about it at all. I was talking last week to Ken West, the man who gave us natural burial, and he opined that they think of them as uncorrupted. People shut their eyes to decomposition, whether violent and […]
