The recent deathfest in and around London’s Royal Festival Hall – entitled “Death: Southbank Centre’s Festival for the Living” – was cleverly fronted by an eyecatching exhibition of splendidly imaginative coffins. “Boxed: Fabulous Coffins from UK and Ghana” showcased a wonderful selection of inventive coffins from the Paa Joe workshop in Ghana, and Crazy Coffins in Nottingham.
Visitors toured the coffins with a smile on their face: here death was met by wit, imagination and artistry. In place of a plain and sombre traditional casket, there was a giant guitar, a huge ballet shoe, and outsized skateboard, a mini-skip, a miniature aeroplane, a luxury car, a polar explorer’s sled, a cocoa pod and a hungry-looking lion.
It started in Ghana
It is the Ghanaians who have led the way: caskets are designed to reflect the character or passions of the deceased: a mobile phone, coke bottle, a giant cigarette, a fish, hens and chicks, a sewing machine, a football boot. The man credited with creating this modern phenomenon in the capital, Accra, is Seth Kane Kwei (1922–1992), who extrapolated from a local tradition of coffin building to give it a new imaginative thrust. Paa Joe, whose coffins were featured in the Southbank show, is Seth Kane Kwei’s nephew.
Why not go Crazy?
Crazy Coffins of Nottingham echo this tradition – and with a name like that, you know what territory you are entering. They have been in the business of creating weird and wonderful coffins for over 15 years now, ever since a woman rang the traditional coffin makers Vic Fearn & Company (owners of Crazy Coffins) and asked for a casket in the shape of an aeroplane. Most of their beautifully crafted designs are commissioned by clients while they are still alive, for their own personal use.
Several other companies are bringing a new kind of gaiety to funerals, without going the full sculptural hog of Crazy Coffins. Creative Coffins use a standard shape of coffin in cardboard and wood, but decorated it with bright and imaginative designs – tulips, a red telephone box, a DJ turntables, woodland scenery, a chocolate box, peas (with the inscription “Rest in Peas”). And if you can’t find anything you like off-the-peg, you can commission your own design.
So what would you choose?
Picture credit: “Hen coffin by Kudjoe Affutu, 2008”, photo by Regula Tschumi, reproduced courtesy of Wikimedia Commons in accordance with the terms of Creative Commons.
