Memorial options
Fireworks, vinyl records, stratospheric flights and other ways of marking a life that fit no other category.
Most memorials from ashes fall into recognisable groups: something to keep, something to wear, something that grows. This page is for the rest — the options families find when none of those is right, and when the person being remembered would have wanted something that made people laugh, or look up, or put a record on.
They have one thing in common worth saying at the outset: several of them are irreversible. A firework is fired once. Ashes released in the stratosphere do not come back. Decide what else is planned for the remains before committing to any of them.
Memorial fireworks — ashes loaded into rockets or a display. Self-fire sets from £399, and they use more of the remains than almost anything else: 200–300 grams.
Ashes into space — either a balloon flight to above 100,000 feet, released into the stratosphere and filmed on the way (from £3,950 with the UK provider), or a rocket launch to orbit, the Moon or beyond (from $3,495 with Celestis).
Ashes pressed into vinyl — a playable record made with a portion of the ashes in the pressing, with audio of your choosing.
Ashes in tattoo ink — a portion of the ashes prepared by a laboratory and infused into pigment. About a tablespoon, and the cheapest option here by a wide margin.
Also in the same spirit, and not yet covered by us in detail: ashes fired into ceramic glazes, and memorial diamonds grown from the carbon in the remains, which have their own category. Reefs cast into the seabed sit with the living memorials.
This is the practical difference, and it decides the order you do things in:
| Option | Roughly how much |
|---|---|
| Tattoo ink | about a tablespoon |
| Vinyl record | a small portion |
| Stratospheric flight | a symbolic portion |
| Rocket launch | a symbolic portion |
| Fireworks | 200–300 g per set |
An adult cremation returns about 1.8–2.7 kg, so everything except fireworks leaves the great majority of the remains for an urn, a tree or a keepsake.
Yes, with the ordinary rules that apply anyway. Fireworks must not be set off in a public place or between 11pm and 7am outside four exempt nights. Scattering on land needs the landowner's permission.
Not always. Self-fire fireworks at £399 cost less than most memorial jewellery set in gold, and far less than a memorial diamond. Space flights are the exception: per gram, they are the most expensive memorial there is.
Common, and worth taking slowly. These choices tend to divide people more than an urn does. Nothing has to be decided quickly: ashes keep indefinitely.
In-depth guides
Fireworks use more of a person's ashes than almost any other memorial — 200 to 300 grams in a single set. Here is how the ashes are loaded, what UK providers charge, and the questions worth asking before you book.
A memorial tattoo carrying a portion of someone's ashes is possible in the UK — but not by handing an urn to a tattooist. Here is how prepared ink works, what artists are risking, and the questions to ask before you book.
For someone whose life was inseparable from music, pressing ashes into a vinyl record may be the most resonant memorial possible. A complete UK guide for 2025.
Tell us what you are weighing up and we will come back with options that fit — what they cost and how long they take. There is no deadline on this decision.