[Company staffers and visitors posing for a photo with a biobased coffin]
[A mushroom coffin]
[A couple posing for a photo behind a coffin]
[Coffins in storage facility]
[Handles integrated into the coffin structure]
[Men closing the top of the coffin]
Bob Hendrikx (interview): “From my perspective, it’s all about like, hey, how can we give humanity a positive footprint? And I really want to collaborate with nature to do a lot of study and research towards nature and especially mushrooms. And I learned that they are the biggest recyclers on the planet. So I thought, hey, why can we not be part of the cycle of life? And then decided to grow a mushroom-based coffin.”
[Grounded mycelium mushroom falling from a glass jar]
Bob Hendrikx (interview): “So what we can see here is a root structure of mushrooms and here we see all the wires that make the product so naturally strong. Here we have a piece of mushroom, and this is really hard.”
[Mycelium mushroom]
Bob Hendrikx (interview): “So we don’t make stuff, we grow stuff. We grow mushroom-based coffins and we do it from mycelium, which is the root structure of mushrooms and upcycled hemp fibre. And together, we grow them in a mould. And only seven days into a finished product that within the soil, biodegrades in only 45 days.”
[Coffin with a trading name ‘Loop Living Cocoon’]
[‘Loop ForestBed’, a cot covered with hemp-made fabric]
[Urn with trade name ‘Loop EarthRise’ with a tree integrated on the top of the cover]
Bob Hendrikx (interview): “Our main product is, of course, the world’s first living coffin. But cremation is an ongoing trend. So a lot of people were asking, like, hey, when are you going to produce an urn? But for us, our vision is to enrich life after death. So when we want to put our products into the soil. So this one is a beautiful combination of a regular urn in which you can put in the ashes or with a tree on top. So if you put this in the soil, this will biodegrade and enrich nature.”
[Coffin set in a funeral car]
Roy van Boekel (interview): “And in nature, it’s important that are used only wooden and natural products. So nothing that isn’t natural. But this product is the next step in this sustainability because, for example, a wooden box is growing in dozens of years and this product is just growing a few days. So in a sustainable way, it’s much better.”
[Coffin being prepared for the presentation]
[Moss being placed in the coffin]
Shawn Harris (interview): “We all have different cultures and different ways of wanting to be buried in the world. But I do think there’s a lot of us, a huge percentage of us, that would like it differently. And it’s been very old school the same way for 50 or 100 years. And this is a shake up and this is different and it’s much more, I think, pure. And we’re not becoming chemicals, we’re not becoming burned and we’re just being taken care of by nature. And I think that’s so yeah, it is, it’s inspiring, but it’s also a great business case, especially when we’re trying to make more impact at this time on Earth.”
[Coffin being sprayed with a mist of water]
[Setting a head position in the coffin]
This script was provided by The Associated Press.