Bottles made into Remembrance Day tribute poppies

16 hours ago

Adrian Harms,in Pirbrightand

Craig Buchan,South East

Reverend Joanna Day said the display was produced by teams of volunteers

BBC Reverend Joanna Day, wearing a church uniform and a poppy pin badge. Dozens of plastic poppy sculptures are embedded in the ground behind her. — Reverend Joanna Day said the display was produced by teams of volunteers

Volunteers have installed hundreds of poppies made from plastic bottles ahead of Remembrance Day.

St Michael & All Angels Church in Pirbright, Surrey asked for donations of bottles and enlisted the help of parishioners to turn them into the artificial flowers.

The display is accompanied by a "ghost soldier" sculpture.

Reverend Joanna Day, a curate at the church, said the installation was "inspired by the amazing displays at the Tower of London and at other churches around the country".

Ceramic poppies were first displayed at the Tower of London in 2014, with a smaller exhibit marking 80 years since VE Day in World War Two in 2025.

Day said "all kinds of volunteers from the church, from the village, have been participating in a wide variety of ways" for the Pirbright display, including painting the flowers, gluing them in place and planting them outside the church.

"We know that we all want to live in a peaceful country and in a peaceful world but sadly that's not always possible," she told BBC Radio Surrey.

The curate said it was "incredibly important" to remember past conflicts and honour those involved.

The poppies were made from recycled plastic bottles and then painted

St Michael & All Angels Church Dozens of plastic poppies stuck in the grounds of a church. The flowers are climbing up a wooden cross next to a chicken wire sculpture of a World War One soldier, which is see-thru. The stone church and some old headstones are visible behind the display. — The poppies were made from recycled plastic bottles and then painted

Church warden Helen Whitworth, who organised the project, said she was "very proud" of what had been created.

"Every morning in the porch we had a huge bag of donations of bottles," she said.

Nina Kearsey, a volunteer who helped make the "ghost soldier" sculpture with Whitworth, said: "We learned a lot about chicken wire, I learned a bit about rifles and we spent a few evenings together just sort of wrestling limbs into place."

Whitworth said it had been "very hard to see what it's going to look like" to start with, but, by the end "you could just see this sea of red appearing in the churchyard, it was amazing".

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