The world’s first coffin desk is to be launched at Earls Court this September at 100% Design, the UK’s leading contemporary design show.
With the rise in the retirement age the desk has been designed to cope with sudden death in the workplace and is equipped with a range of devises, including a unique carbon dioxide sensor which reacts to shortage of breath.
Copenhagen based designer, Tomas Jensen is positive that there will be a lot of interest at the Show. “I’ve already had enquiries from local councils across the UK, especially from the education sector where mortality rates are set to rise, so I am confident that we will have plenty of orders.” It comes in a range of options from low cost veneers through to more expensive hard woods.
The coffin desk was demonstrated recently to journalists, international buyers and undertakers at a special preview at Jensen’s studios in Copenhagen. Chris White from the Jennings Group of undertakers said, “It’s an impressive piece of furniture and will really save us time when we go out to a job. The deceased will be boxed and packed within minutes and can simply be wheeled out to the waiting hearse with the minimum of fuss.”
The desk comes into operation if the sensor detects low levels of CO2. A centrally-located and electrically-powered compressor begins to activate a pneumatic device which then transforms the flat surface of the desk into a rectangular box. A secondary device can be attached to any office chair which, when zero C02 is detected, tips the deceased neatly inside the coffin and the lid shuts tight.
“The real beauty of the coffin desk,” said Jensen “is that it will not disturb other colleagues. In our trials the process was so fast and efficient that they did not realise the person sitting next to them had gone.”
A spokesman for public sector trade union UNISON said, “Whilst we applaud innovation in the workplace our concern is that local government employees who are merely taking forty winks could end up in the morgue ahead of their time. However it is down to individual public sector organisations to look at their own purchasing and personnel arrangements.”
Jensen is now working on a special cremation devise inspired by the office microwave and paper shredder.
