Respect

The amazing designer Kenneth Grange died and, in addition to the discussion of his contributions to postwar design in massively profound ways, his NYT obit had this wonderful tidbit.

Mr. Grange designed and built his own coffin. He got the idea after his mother died in 1997.

“I was at the undertakers looking through a terrible green catalog of coffins, all of which were awful and expensive, but we had to pick one,” he told The Daily Telegraph. “I thought to myself how ridiculous it is that I am spending my life haranguing people to live with well-designed things and when I go, it could be in one of these dumb boxes.”

He built a bookshelf that matched the shape of his body.

“This one fits me like a glove and the lid is behind it — it’s just a matter of taking the bookshelves out, screwing the lid on and away we go,” he said. “The only problem will be getting whoever is responsible to follow my instruction.”

That would be his wife, Apryl.

“It’s a bit macabre, isn’t it?” she said. “So I think it might have to stay as a very useful bookcase.”

First of all, anyone who designs their own coffin has my lifelong respect. Or deathlong, as the case may be. But one who designs it as bookshelves in the shape of his own body? Now that’s a goddamn legend.