Cardboard Engineering

Ged Kelly and Efrem Cockett both work (hardly a surprise with names like that) in the funeral business. I missed the Jonathan Ross show where their handicraft was first shown to the nation and so it came as something of a surprise when, passing an undertakers window display in Petersfield yesterday, I saw the diversity of their entrepreneurial endeavours. What Messrs. Kelly and Cockett manufacture are environment-friendly cardboard coffins printed with the design of your choice. The company is based in Guernsey and trades as www.creativecoffins.com.

Their catalogue ranges from pretty sunflower coffins, through patriotic union jack designs, to (oh dear) comical coffins. If you (or your grieving family) so wish your coffin can be printed to resemble a packet of frozen peas inscribed, inevitably, “Rest in Peas”. Or, subject to copyright laws, a cigarette carton, a Smirnoff vodka coffin, or a wine bottle with your name and date on the label.

Oh hell, I’d been worried enough when wicker coffins were introduced - I imagined the thing creaking loudly under the weight of the Rumbling Nappa, or worse still splitting open. Now I live in fear that my survivors will order a Gordons Gin coffin in which to despatch me.