When it comes to funerals, two choices usually spring to mind.
Most people will opt for either a traditional ground burial in a wooden coffin or a cremation, which turns a person’s remains into ashes.
But an alternative method is now available – and it’s good news for nature-lovers.
A company has designed the world’s first ‘living coffin’, made of natural materials which degrade in just 45 days once buried.
Dutch company Loop Biotech, who are behind the design, grow the ‘Living Cocoon’ from local mushroom species and upcycled hemp fibres in the space of a week.
They pad out the interior with a soft hemp bed and a pillow of moss, with the option to ‘upgrade’ to a bed of wool or soft cotton.
The coffin itself weighs 30kg and has a carrying capacity of up to 200kg, with six integrated handles for easy transportation.
The unusual burial method is already available in the UK, but it isn’t cheap – the living coffin costs around £3,000.
The world’s first ‘living coffin’ is designed to biodegrade within 45 days, ‘becoming one’ with nature
Those with a particular love for nature may be interested in the environmentally-friendly option, the company behind the casket said
Mark Ancker recently become the first person in the US to be buried in the eco-friendly casket.
‘I have confidence that my dad will be fully part of the garden by winter,’ Marsya Ancker told Fast Company. ‘He didn’t want to be embalmed, just to return to the Earth in a place that he loved.’
Her father always used to tell her that he wanted to be buried naked, under a tree in the woods.
When he passed away in June, her first call was to Loop Biotech and her father has since become the first person in the US to be buried in the ‘Living Cocoon’ – in a forest clearing on his property in Maine.
So far, the company has sold around 2,500 caskets in Europe – mostly in the Netherlands – but their coffins are also available to be shipped to the UK.
‘Become part of nature’s majestic loop of life and enrich the earth with the world’s first living coffin,’ their website reads.
The company said traditional wooden coffins ‘not only require decades for trees to grow but also involve chopping, importing and processing them’.
Their ‘Living Cocoon’, however, can be fully grown in seven days using local raw materials, eliminating unnecessary transportation and the need for additional paint, glue, varnish or screws.
Marsya Ancker (pictured) recently buried her father in the ‘Living Cocoon’ – marking the first time a person in the US was buried in this type of casket
The casket was buried in the forest in Mr Ancker’s property in Maine. His daughter said he will be ‘fully part of the garden by winter’
So far, the company has sold around 2,500 caskets in Europe – mostly in the Netherlands – but their coffins are also available to be shipped to the UK
The coffin itself weighs 30kg and has a carrying capacity of up to 200kg, with six integrated handles for easy transportation. It can easily be lowered into the ground using ropes
To make their caskets they mix mycelium – the ‘root’ system of mushrooms – with hemp, a plant often cultivated for its fibre. The mixture is poured into a mould and a coffin grows out of it over the space of a week.
The company has a 1,500 square-metre growing facility in Delft, Netherlands, with the capacity to grow 500 caskets at a time.
The living coffin costs around £3,000, and can also be used for cremations. Meanwhile their biodegradable urns cost roughly £300.
Meanwhile price of a wooden coffin can vary significantly depending on the type of wood, level of craftsmanship and whether it’s for cremation or burial – but can cost as little as £270 and up to around £2,000 in the UK.
‘Funerals can be more than endings – they can be beginnings,’ Bob Hendrikx, founder of Loop Biotech, said.
‘We created the Loop Living Cocoon to offer a way for humans to enrich nature after death. It’s about leaving the world better than we found it.’
So-called ‘green’ burials, which have grown in popularity since the 1990s, are a more environmentally friendly alternative to traditional funerals.
They focus on minimising environmental impact by using biodegradable coffins or shrouds and avoiding embalming, often taking place in designated natural burial grounds such as woodlands or meadows.
The casket comes with a bed of moss, complete with a ‘pillow’ (left) but buyers have the option of ‘upgrading’ to a bed of wool (right)
The casket, which costs around £3,000, can also be used in cremations. the company explained
Loop Biotech also provide environmentally-friendly urns, made of the same material, which biodegrade once buried
People have the option of including a small plant on the top of the urn, which sticks out of the ground and can grow into a tree
‘We have helped many families in the UK with our sustainable funeral solutions,’ a spokesman for Loop told MailOnline.
They said that last weekend Poppy’s Funerals – a funeral director based in London – had a burial with one of their Living Cocoons.
The latest burial option follows an emerging trend for ‘boil in a bag’ funerals that dissolve bodies and flush them down the drain.
The method, which could soon become available in Britain after catching on around the world, is officially known as water cremation or alkaline hydrolysis.
It involves rapidly decomposing a corpse in water and alkaline chemicals under high temperatures, leaving only liquid and bones.
The liquid, known as ‘effluent’, can go down the drain with other wastewater and bones that can be ground to ash for the bereaved owner to take home.
Advocates say the method is better for the environment, but others believe it is an undignified way to dispose of the dead.
This article was originally published by a www.dailymail.co.uk . Read the Original article here. .