Alternatives To Flowers On Coffin

Flowers have been common at funerals for an extremely long time – some archaeological evidence from prehistoric burial sites in Iraq even suggests that it might date back 60,000 years or more!

There’s nothing wrong with upholding a tradition if you want to, but at the same time, lots of people in today’s world are looking for alternatives to flowers on coffins at funerals. While there’s always the option of leaving the coffin bare, it does look nice to have something there instead.

This can be something that speaks to the personality, interests, and life of the person being remembered. We’ll go over several different options here to give you some inspiration on how to decorate the coffin of your friend or loved one.

One thing to remember is that although this article is about “alternatives” to flowers, there’s no reason why you have to have only one or the other.

If you’d like to keep the flowers but also have some of these other things as well, there should be no reason why you can’t. Consult with your funeral director to work out the details.

Alternatives to Traditional Funeral Flowers

Natural Coffin Sprays

Whilst still strictly flowers, most people don’t consider adding natural-looking flowers to the coffin. The flowers don’t need to be bright, colourful arrangements, think wild meadow type arrangements that might compliment an eco-conscious / green funeral.

Photographs

Photographs can be a great alternative to flowers because they give you all kinds of choices. You can make it fun and light-hearted by choosing an informal photo of the deceased laughing, having fun with their family, etc.

Or, if you prefer, you can keep things more solemn by having a more serious portrait photograph. In fact, you don’t have to limit it to just one photograph, either. You could use several, or even a whole album.

Some people find that making an album of their favourite photographs to remember their loved one is a rewarding experience in itself, and using that to decorate the coffin at the funeral can be a heart-warming touch.

Books

If your loved one was someone who loved reading, one or more books could be a great option to replace flowers on their coffin. This allows you to celebrate their personality and interests with a lot more flexibility than flowers might be able to do.

Readers are often very attached to a book, series, or author, and this can be a chance to remember them alongside the thing they love. It also gives you the opportunity to combine this with a reading.

If you know there’s a particular passage in a book that they loved, then there can be a reading of it during the service. This nicely connects the speeches with the decoration. It’s an even stronger choice if they’ve written a book themselves, as this can symbolise their life’s achievements.

Vegetables

Yep, you did read that correctly. It might sound weird, but vegetable sprays have started to come into fashion as a popular alternative to the usual flowers on coffins. They keep the natural feel and colour of flowers while still providing something nice and different.

It’s a particularly good idea if the deceased loved keeping an allotment or vegetable garden, and you might even be able to use their own vegetables

Religious Tokens

Death and what comes afterwards is an important focus for most religions, so it’s only natural that a religious person might want something to symbolise their faith placed on their coffin at their funeral.

Whether it’s a holy book, a symbol like a cross, or something else, the idea that their faith will be represented on their coffin can be a great comfort to the deceased. This will also tie in nicely with the service, since a religious person will probably be having a religious funeral.

Statuettes

The first Chinese emperor, Qin Shi Huang, was buried with an entire army of over 8000 soldiers to protect him in the world beyond. In terms of scale, this might not quite be achievable for most of us, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do something similar.

A statuette on top of the coffin can be used to represent all kinds of things – it could be a religious token (see the previous paragraph), or it could be a trophy that the deceased won during their life.

For example, if they were a keen sportsperson, then having a trophy that shows their achievements could be perfect.

Sometimes people go for busts or statuettes of their favourite historical figures – great leaders from history like Napoleon and Augustus Caesar are fairly common, but you can pick anybody they admired.

Toys

The death of a child is always particularly tragic. While there’s nothing wrong with using flowers on the coffin to remember them, if you want to use something that was dear to the child, you could put one of their favourite toys or teddy bears in its place. This can feel more personal and sincere than flowers.

Letters

Letters can hold a huge symbolic importance to the deceased and to others as well. It might be that the deceased has written a letter to their friends and loved ones for them to read during the service, and a copy of this can be left on the coffin.

Sometimes, other letters with sentimental value are chosen instead, like old love letters or letters that refer to an important event in the person’s life.

There’s also the option of including letters written to the deceased by their family and friends for the funeral so that they can express their feelings for them for the occasion.

Jewellery

Jewellery is usually designed to look beautiful, and that makes it great for looking nice on top of a coffin at funerals. The other thing is that jewellery often has a lot of sentimental value that can make it doubly suited for the occasion.

Wedding rings are popular choices to display on the coffin, for example, but whole sets of jewellery can make an even bigger impression, if the deceased liked to wear a lot of it.

Cremation Ashes

Not the deceased’s, of course, but they might have the jar of ashes of somebody close to them. A husband or wife is the obvious choice, but it doesn’t have to stop there. Some people even have their pet’s ashes on their coffin.

This can symbolise and celebrate the love and connection between the deceased and their nearest and dearest, and underline the comforting idea that they’re together again in death.

Music

Of course, you can’t put music itself on top of the coffin but what about a record? If the deceased was a lover of music, then they might have a particular album or recording that they loved.

Since the ceremony will probably include music anyway, you could choose to play some of the same music from the record on the coffin.

This has the double bonus of allowing you to control that atmosphere of the service, from light and joyful to sombre and serious. You could even use several different records to showcase some of the different kinds of music they liked and use them at different stages in the ceremony.

Medals

If the deceased was in the forces, then they might have earned some medals during their time there. If that’s the case, then they can be a great way of commemorating their proud service and sharing an important part of their life.

This kind of service often forms a significant part of someone’s life, so they might make it known before they die that they want to be remembered as part of the funeral.

Hobby Items

Everyone has hobbies of one kind or another and for a lot of people, they form an important part of their lives. Hobbies represent their personality and interests and are often how they meet many of their friends.

There are almost as many different hobbies as there are people, but most of them offer something that could go on top of a coffin.

If they were a keen angler, then why not put their favourite fishing rod on there? Or perhaps they were a serious chess player? Chess sets look good already, and using their favourite set could be the perfect thing to set off the look of the coffin.

Final Thoughts

A funeral is always going to be an occasion that comes with a lot of sadness, but it’s also a chance to remember everything that you loved about your friend or loved one. That can take all kinds of different forms, so don’t feel as though you have to stick to the traditional flowers on the coffin if you don’t want to.

There could be all kinds of things that you could use to express the interests and personality of the deceased, and hopefully this article has given you some great inspiration to get started doing that.

All people are unique, so you might not see the exact thing that suits your loved one on this list, but plenty of these ideas can be combined and adapted to make the perfect tribute. You can also ask the funeral director you’re using for ideas and assistance to get it just right.