A series of collaborative events getting creative with life and death, CSI: Sittingbourne co-hosted with Creatabot, poet Dan Simpson, and academics from the University of Kent, supported by Creative Estuary.

Over four events in October 2021, CSI: Sittingbourne displayed special archaeological finds from our Roman and Anglo-Saxon collections. These objects from jewellery to swords were all found in grave burials, which were used to open up discussions of rituals and traditions around death. Our bright green coffin (turned display case) travelled to events at Chatham, Southend-on-Sea and Gravesend, and pitched up outside our CSI: Sittingbourne home.

  • A man closely looks at Anglo-Saxon objects in the coffin display case, using a magnifying glass.
  • A hand points out the sword among the Anglo-Saxon objects in the coffin display case.
  • A woman looks at Anglo-Saxon objects in the coffin display.
  • A woman wearing the branded Coffin Tales Roadshow t-shirt helps a young woman to cut out skull-shaped biscuits with a cookie cutter.
  • Skull-shaped biscuits ready for baking.
  • Baked biscuits in single packages with handwritten notes on - "Be positive and happy", "Always be happy & positive & believe in yourself", they read.
  • A young woman and an older woman weave cloth tape on a standing loom.
  • Lots of cloth tapes with handwritten notes on hang waiting to be woven onto the loom.
  • The standing loom with half-finished woven artwork, featuring handwritten messages on cloth tapes.

Creative practitioner Creatabot invited participants to cook and bake, inspired by different historical traditions of funeral foods, such as Victorian biscuits. Poet Dan Simpson and textile artist Georgia Wyver physically weaved together words, with cloth tape on which participants wrote their wishes for their lives and for others. The University of Kent used these workshops to research how heritage and creativity can impact well-being related to death and dying.

For more information about these events, please email coffintalesroadshow@gmail.com.