Alex Collis Celebrant

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Alex Collis Celebrant

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🌈 🧡 Creative, colourful and down to earth humanist ceremonies for weddings, namings and funerals 🧡 🌈

30/10/2026

Overnight, I appear to have somehow turned 52!

Taking the day off to enjoy some birthday shenanigans 🥳

29/10/2026

This might just be the place that changes my mind about cremation...

Lake View has a real sense of peace about it as you look out over the beautiful Fen landscape and wide, open skies. Bonus heron sighting.

The site is a nature reserve and run as sustainably as possible (with electric rather gas cremation).

Plus it has Stanton working there, who is an absolute legend among local chapel attendants.

It was the perfect place to say goodbye to M today, and I'm already looking forward to being back again...

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I’m Alex, a Cambridge based creative funeral celebrant and death worker, and I help people plan down to earth, personal and colourful goodbyes 🧡

09/10/2026

One in five people are now choosing a direct cremation. The way we say goodbye is changing, and people no longer feel they have to have a traditional funeral.

But having nothing at all - no way of marking someone's death and the huge changes that brings with it - can feel as though something, somehow has been left unresolved.

Even when they chose a direct cremation, you can still hold a funeral. It might just look very different... and that's a good thing.

For B, he wanted a direct cremation but his sister felt she needed a day to say goodbye. We gathered last week to bury his ashes with his grandparents, told stories and decorated the space with plants placed into some of the mugs he'd collected throughout his life.

Simple, brief, but so important and so needed.

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I'm Alex, a Cambridge based humanist celebrant and I love showing people how creative, colourful and joyous funerals can be.

If you're planning a celebration of someone's life, take a look at my pinned post on how to work with me.

These ceremonies can take place anywhere. One of the most beautiful farewells I've ever witnessed was held in the person's back garden, surrounded by all the beauty they'd created.

I love the spontaneity of these gatherings, hearing the laughter and the familiar clink of glasses. As the stories flow, you can see people visibly relax and start to have fun.

Personally I'm very sold on the idea of a communal bonfire with toasted marshmallows...

One of my biggest frustrations as a funeral celebrant is the time issue. Capturing all of who someone was in half an hour (sometimes less) is like trying to comb water...

Holding a separate celebration of life sidesteps all of that. You can slow down and really take your time.

Not feeling rushed matters.

These ceremonies have so much potential for creativity... and getting people involved 🧡

📸 credit to DEAD GOOD SISTERS 💀 Katy & Lindsey Vigurs on Unsplash

When I started as a celebrant seven years ago, this was much more unusual. Then COVID happened, and everything changed. Funerals changed.

What started out as a negative, has - over the past few years - slowly turned into a positive, as people have begun to reclaim funerals and realis

08/10/2026

Here's just a few of the things that I reckon make me stand out as a funeral celebrant...

Let me know what makes you different too 🌈 🧡

📸 Photos 1 and 6 by the uber talented Sarah | North East Brand Photographer and Business Coach for DEAD GOOD SISTERS 💀 Katy & Lindsey Vigurs

While I'd never, ever shame anyone for the words they choose, for me personally, I prefer to use a much wider range of words than just 'funeral'.

I know, I know its a bit of an odd thing to say for someone who makes a living as a funeral celebrant.

But what happens when people gather in that way to remember someone, to share stories... it feels much bigger than that to me.

When people hear the word funeral, more often than not, what they'll be visualising is lots of black, a hearse and a coffin... that sort of thing.

That's the Victorians at work again! None of these conventions really existed until they thought them up and invented the funeral business.

Funerals used to belong to communities, and gradually, communities are taking them back. Working with a funeral director, if they choose to, to reinvent their farewell into something that feels familiar, authentic and personal.

More of this please!

There are so many other ways of describing what a funeral does and what it means.

I'd love to hear your thoughts...

Again, this is just my personal feelings based on what I've experienced in seven years as a funeral celebrant. That doesn't mean it would work for everyone!

Humans can be complex (often wonderfully so) and difficult and when, at the end of someone's life, we look back... our farewell to them doesn't have to try and hide any of that.

It should meet them in their truth with honesty and with compassion.

Sometimes people can make it very hard to love them, and they can leave behind hugely complicated feelings. So it doesn't, to me, feel right to make an assumption that they were loved.

That's why you'll always hear me using either their name or 'your person'. And then I will listen to you talk about them and the relationship you shared.

Dead. Died. That is what this is, so let's name it and let's become familiar with death - and with the language of death - the way we once were.

I'm really curious to know your th

29/09/2026

A lovely start to my week with this review from Helen's sister after her natural burial earlier this month.

I always think that handing over your memories of someone to a stranger and asking them to tell that person's story, is a real show of trust and a hugely generous gesture.

At every funeral meeting, my number one aim is to help people feel reassured and safe, so that they're able to share their memories with me - and be sure that those memories will be treated with real care and respect.

That matters to me very much because, in truth, everything that follows - the words, the tone and feel of the funeral - stems from that first meeting.

I remember talking to the celebrant about my dad, and how strange it felt, and I keep that conversation in mind whenever I'm on my way to meet a new family.

Good to have this reminder at the start of a week of family meetings... 🙏

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I'm Alex, a Cambridge based humanist celebrant and I love showing people how creative, colourful and joyous funerals can be.

If you're planning a celebration of someone's life, take a look at my pinned post on how to work with me. You can either go through your chosen funeral director or contact me directly.

📸 by the brilliant Lisa Gilby | London Brand Photographer

21/09/2026

Have a wonderful honeymoon Ellie Hubbard and Barry Clare! Or perhaps I should say 新婚旅行おめでとう

Thank you so much for trusting me with telling your story, and for the most wonderful, sunny Saturday in the woods 🍄🪵 Your wedding vows (or wows as they're now called) were perfect, and the tale of your 91st Street Garden proposal will forever be one of my favourites 🗽

Sorry that Tom Hanks didn't make it all the way to Norfolk, but I guess you can't have everything, and we still had Henning!

Lots of love to you both, you've got the most amazing future ahead of you...

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Swipe to see the guest hiding out in Ellie's bouquet, made by the very talented

Hands up who loves a celebrant led wedding 🙋🏻‍♀️

20/09/2026

🍄🪵 WOODLAND WEDDING WEEKEND 🪵🍄

So much time, care and love went into the finishing touches for Ellie and Barry's wedding decor...

Hening the Troll, who's become an important part of their family, made several appearances throughout the day (including hiding in Ellie's bouquet and presenting Cakenhagen) 🇩🇰

Their cats, Charlie and Converse were there in spirit, on these handheld masks for the guests 🐾

Ellie, who is ridiculously talented, handmade lots of the decor herself, including these amazing chandeliers dripping with greenery and moss 🌿

And their seating plan was just 🔥 with each table name celebrating their shared love of travel, especially through Scandinavia. It was there, in a Finnish forest, that Barry knew for certain that he wanted to ask Ellie to marry him 🌲🌲🌲

It all made an already memorable day even more special and I loved hearing all the oohs and ahs from the guests as they started arriving...

20/09/2026

✨️ Magic ✨️

That's the only way to describe yesterday at Hubbard's Farm Woodland Wedding Venue, Norfolk.

Beneath the trees Ellie Hubbard and Barry Clare made the most beautiful vows to each other in front of their family and friends. Just the perfect setting for a cosy, intimate wedding.

The day before they'd been busy transforming the space with flowers grown specially by Ellie's mum (kudos to Karolyn for managing to keep them going through the heatwave!)

There were also several many woodland trolls, including one specially crafted by a friend as a gift for Ellie and Barry that stood at the entrance to the ceremony space, holding some wooden wedding rings.

Loved every single minute of it!

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Hello, I'm Alex and I'm a humanist celebrant creating perfectly imperfect, unique and down to earth wedding ceremonies that are filled with colour and joy 🧡🌈

Address

Cambridge

Telephone

07587 297657

Website

http://www.alexcolliscelebrant.co.uk/

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