I built my own coffin to use as a bookshelf until I die

People are dying for this Do it yourself job.

Throughout the place folks are constructing their very own coffins — and then exhibiting them as decoration in their households till their deaths.

Leona Oceania, 52, of Portland, Maine has a established of wonderful pine bookshelves exhibiting her preferred books and a few knickknacks in her living room.

She informed the Wall Road Journal that attendees “tend to test it out” but handful of guess that the cabinets will one working day be removed to make room for Oceania as she’s laid to relaxation and buried in her home made coffin née bookshelf.

“[Death] has generally intrigued me. I really do not think in a weird way,” she spelled out.

Oceania works as an administrator at a municipal general public functions office and doubles as a demise doula, as perfectly as a property funeral manual, hospice volunteer and general public speaker on the artwork of dying effectively, according to the Journal.

Chuck Lakin, a retired school librarian who lives in Waterville, Maine, helped Oceania to build her coffin/bookshelf as part of his coffin-creating system. He also makes customized coffins to purchase.

Lakin’s web-site, Lastthings.net, is a location “for people who want to be far more in manage of what transpires to their very own system after demise, or would like to discover means to care for a cherished one’s system after loss of life.”

He operates to assistance people fully grasp decrease-price options to coffins and companies readily available at funeral residences — which includes developing your own.

Individuals fascinated in building their have closing resting area can go to 1 of Lakin’s classes or obtain plans from his internet site, choosing from a “quck,” “toe pincher,” “green,” “wedged,” “plywood” or “bookcase” coffin. He informed The Put up that developing a coffin charges about $300 for the lumber and about $500 for his experience.

A normal spouse and children usually spends about $2,000 to $3,000 on a coffin, Joshua Slocum, executive director of the Funeral Individuals Alliance, which attempts to protect grieving family members from extreme charges, instructed the Journal.

Woodworker Lakin was impressed to support other individuals navigate alternative funeral proceedings immediately after his father’s felt impersonal. He’s been building an normal of a few to 5 coffins a yr due to the fact 2000 but produced 10 final 12 months.

Lakin told The Write-up that it is an “honor” to aid persons by means of what can be a difficult time.

To catch the attention of people to his courses, Lakin can be observed at the Widespread Ground Place Reasonable in Unity, Maine virtually each and every September the place he displays a single of his selfmade coffins.

“There are always people who want to have their picture taken in the coffin,” he instructed the Journal. “Thinner men and women have squeezed two of them in there.”

Lakin even ventured out of Maine to Massachusetts to host a coffin-developing workshop at All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church in Greenfield.

The morbid but exciting venture took about two to three hrs of do the job and laughter, in accordance to just one attendee.

“We just experienced so substantially enjoyable,” Joan Pillsbury, a retired nurse, instructed the Journal. At 1 position, Pillsbury climbed into her personal coffin and laid down to get the greatest angle for her power drill.

“We had been laughing,” she remembered. The beginner carpenters were so mesmerized by their function that they forgot to contact any of the snacks and refreshments delivered.

Just after crawling out of her completed coffin, Pillsbury loaded it up into the back again of her Subaru station wagon and afterwards established it up in her home’s exercise area.

“I think, which is a single issue my little ones will not have to do,” she reported of easing the load of her burial plans.

Donald Joralemon, 69, a professor emeritus of anthropology at Smith Faculty, also introduced home a handmade coffin from Lakin’s event. He added a coat of shellac to it and set it on wooden blocks in his basement.

He’s at relieve with the thought of his demise and has laid out crystal clear and straightforward instructions to his loved ones customers in preparing for his passing.

“I want to be taken from my bed to the box and then instantly to the burial web page we have in our pasture,” he mentioned.

For all those not able to make it to New England to get Lakin’s help, Casket Builder Provide sells a assortment of items like casket shells and kits ranging from $849 to $2,199.

Now that is some thing to choose to your grave.