Is there a difference between a half couch casket and a perfection half couch style casket?

Answer 1

The looks

Answer 2

Yes, there is, although both types of caskets have a split top. The divided lid has become the most characteristic feature of American style caskets.

In a perfection cut half-couch design, the lid is simply cut into a head and a foot panel, each of which usually has more or less the same length. For viewing, the head panel is opened. The majority of caskets sold in the US today are of the modern perfection cut style.

In the traditional, original or "true" half-couch casket, the foot panel has the same construction as a perfection cut casket, but the head panel differs from it because only the upper part of the lid (the "crown") is opened for viewing, while both the front part and the head end part of the "ogee" (the rim or frame of the lid) remain fastened with hinges to the base (or body) of the casket. These hinged parts of the ogee of the head panel, together with the textile lining attached to them, are also opened up during the viewing. This creates the impression of a wide bed with a pillow in it. With other words, the opened half of the traditional half-couch casket looks wider than the opened half of a perfection cut casket. A closed traditional half-couch casket can be differed from a perfection cut casket by the fact that in the former the line marking the split of the lid is slightly broken, while in a perfection cut casket it is unbroken.

The original half-couch style has become rare. The main reason why it has been replaced by the perfection cut style seems to be the fact, that in metal caskets - which make up the majority of caskets in the US nowadays - only perfection cut models can be equipped with a gasket which gives them the protective property of a sealer casket.