What is a cloth covered casket and what kind of cloth covers are there?

Answer 1

A cloth covered casket is a coffin the exterior of which is covered with textile.

Most cloth covered caskets are made of wood, either of softwood (woods from needle or cone bearing trees like: Pine, Poplar, Spruce, Red Cypress, Cedar and Redwood) or of wood products like particle boards, pressed wood, high strength cardboard, corrugated fiberboard, composite wood or plywood. The cloth for covering the exterior of the casket usually consists of textiles like doeskin (moleskin), broadcloth, plush, lambskin, felt or denim, but sometimes also of brocade, tweed, velvet, suede or other textiles. The cloth may be plain or embossed, for example with patterns like leaves; in rare cases also colorful patterns can be found.

Cloth covered caskets are oftentimes used as infants' caskets, but also as economical adults' coffins, both for earth burials and cremations. Cloth covered caskets often have a square or octagonal shape and a flat top or a "hinged cap" lid; round corner and urn shaped designs are rare. In most cases low cost interiors made of crepe, satin or twill are used. In the US, most cloth covered caskets currently (2014) range between $ 300 and 1,500 in retail prices.

While in 1950 still more than one half of all caskets sold in the US were cloth covered caskets, this proportion fell until 2009 to 11% and is now probably around 10% and while in the 1950s almost every casket manufacturer had cloth covered caskets in its line, there are today only some three dozen companies manufacturing such products. Most of these companies manufacture for local or regional markets only.