Mushroom Coffins: Enriching Life, Even in Death

A biotech startup based in Delft, the Netherlands, created an organic and rounded coffin made from mushroom biodegradable in only 45 days, thus empowering us to enrich life after death.

“With this product, you’re adding value to the soil instead of polluting the soil,” explains Loop Biotech founder Bob Hendrikx. “It’s the only coffin in the world that actually benefits nature.”

The Loop Living Cocoon is made from mycelium – mushrooms’ underground root network – and upcycled hemp, making this new coffin actually good for the soil. Contrary to trees which can take years to grow, mycelium only takes seven days. Loop Biotech offers other burial products to its customers such as the Loop ForestBed, an open-top coffin cot on which the deceased lie wrapped in a biodegradable cloth, and the Loop EarthRise, a biodegradable urn made from the same materials and shape as a tree trunk. A tree sampling is in its lid, turning the urn into a nutrient pod to help the plant grow. Only biodegradable if buried, the urn can be decorated and displayed.