The theme is heavily influenced by my visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York last fall to see their exhibit of mourning attire and by the novel Mrs. Poe by Lynn Cullen. (You can read the blog post about it here.) Add to that I have a murder of fake crows because I've been buying 3-4 new ones every year for the last 15 years or so.
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| Some of my murderous crows |
I created a simple invitation using an image from a London Bills of Mortality from the mid-1600s. These were issued during the Black Plague, I believe. I used Photoshop to cut out the middle so that I could insert my own text.
My before and after images
I based the text of my invitation on some Nineteenth-century funeral invitations. (Don't worry, the invitations are being printed now and your's will be in the mail soon.)
The text is basically as follows:
You are desired to accompany the corpse of
Edgar Allen Poe
to become ashes on Friday, the 30th of October in the year 2015.
A Wake to remember Mr. Poe will begin
at Seven of the clock in the evening.
The Procession to the Funeral Pyre will take place
at Eight of the clock.
Guests will be welcome to partake in refreshment following the cremation.
The back of the invitation quotes part of Poe's obituary.
The guests have been asked to come in mourning attire of either the living or dead which allows people to be as simple or elaborate as they desire. I plan to serve something like sherry and cordials for the first hour as people arrive and view "Poe" in his coffin. I'm hoping to create mourning ribbons for everyone to wear that will be handed out as guests arrive. Here are some samples.
The image on the left is an antique Victorian ribbon sold on Ebay and the images on the right are listed here on Etsy
I've been wanting to incorporate a procession from our house to the firepit in the backyard for sometime. This seems like the perfect opportunity. I'm imagining there will be pallbearers to carry an effigy of Poe that we'll burn in the fire.
Since you learned yesterday that I hate to cook, I'm asking guests to bring an appropriately spooky funeral-themed appetizer. We usually provide the food and drink, but that's my most hated task so I'm asking for help this year.
My husband made a life-size coffin to use as a beer cooler several years ago and that will be pulled into service once again. (hint: glow sticks in the ice really help people in reading labels in a darkened room). I have some other fun decorations that I'll show you as things start coming together. In the meantime, take a look at these ideas from around the web.
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| Rachel Ray Magazine |
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| VictorianaLady.com (the link is broken, alas) |
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| BrooklynLimestone.com |
More to come in the next few weeks.
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