Meet The Last Hurrah Team

Kimba Griffith

Kimba’s skill set is broad, having worked across a myriad of creative and deeply human pursuits, but her calling lies in meeting grieving families just as they are, and offering a safe container for people to create meaningful farewells that include laughter and authentic remembering, while also gently acknowledging feelings of loss, sadness and confusion.

As an acclaimed jazz vocalist, birth attendant, ceremonialist, funeral director, and compassionate companion to the dying, Kimba is able to hold space in a quiet and composed manner, be assertive when advocating for families’ needs and desires, and bring her skills as a writer, ceremony creator and ritualist to craft an authentic ritual, ceremony or last hurrah.

Her unique skill set allows her to assist families navigate planning a farewell in a simple and authentic manner.

Kimba has spoken at panels and been a keynote speaker on the topic of death literacy and family-led funerals for the Florida Independent Funeral Directors’ Association, The Wheeler Centre, The Malt House Theatre, SMCT, The Association of Independent Funeral Directors, ABC radio Big Ideas, The Sophia Club, ABC774 and more.

Nastassia Jones

A New Zealand native, Nastassia has a deep connection to the concept of ‘Whanau’ or extended family and community. After completing her degree in Psychology, Nastassia worked in funeral administration for a not-for-profit funeral provider in Victoria. It was during this time she began to imagine a model for funeral care that encompassed her views on family-centred care and ‘whanau’, and it is these concepts that underpin what she has created in the Last Hurrah,

Nastassia has also worked as an admin and management guru at a highly successful Forensic Cleaning Company and has honed her skills in supporting families and being the first contact at a very traumatic and difficult moment. She has a special gift for working with people living with hoarding disorders, being able to build trust, and create the possibility for some healing work in clearing their spaces. Nastassia is also a family assistance specialist for Kenyon International.

In keeping with her deep passion for community and inclusion, Nastassia was the founder of a women’s skateboarding community, which included skateboarding event management and women’s skateboarding advocacy.

Nastassia is committed to providing an authentic service that is representative of the deceased person and their people. She specialises in creating beautiful and intimate vigil spaces where families can really let go and grieve.

Ophelia Marlowe

Ophelia joined The Last Hurrah in late 2021, She brings with her a multitude of creativity, including an Associate Degree in fashion design and pattern making. Her focus was on a decomposable burial gown, made of pure silk and adorned with preserved insects.

Ophelia describes her journey into the funeral industry as ‘full circle moment’. Having a keen interest in the world of death and dying since she was a teenager, experimenting with taxidermy and learning anatomical and botanical illustration.
Her study taught her to be self-sufficient and ‘make do with what you’ve got’. She has since gone on to learn basket weaving techniques to make pre-term baby caskets from plant fibres.

Since working in the funeral industry, Ophelia has found confidence in supporting grieving families and the beauty in death care. The Last Hurrah has opened her eyes to the benefits of holding viewings and vigils, she has witnessed those transformative moments families have experienced. She speaks of the physical and emotional change in the family’s demeanour, it gives solace that it has made a positive impact on their grief journey.

Ophelia’s newest endeavour is studying Mortuary Science and Embalming.

Mon Jones

Mon joined The Last Hurrah in 2023, drawn to the ethics of their model of care and community.  She is Nastassia’s sister and shares the same values, Mon is driven by those values to support whanau in times of grief. 

Mon has many years of experience working in hospitality and values helping people as they navigate difficult times.  An organisational expert, she also has extensive experience as a logistician with a Diploma in International Freight Forwarding, so she brings attention to detail, ensuring funerals are planned with care.

A career creative, Mon studied jazz piano.  She is the founder of Butterjoy Kitchen – a catering business that honours the classic antipodean celebration good.  A food adventurer, Mon has walked the Camino de Santiago and travelled extensively across South East Asia, revelling in new flavours and foods.  She is currently learning Thai to further this passion.

Suzie Konszky

Suzie brings an incredible level of skill, a quiet and calming demeanour and a deep understanding of the importance of how we care for our dead.

Since completing a BA in Psychology and Psychophysiology, Suzie went on to complete her embalming qualification in 2014, winning awards in her studies for her essay-writing skills on the topic of modern mortuary care.

A lifetime learner, Suzie has also studied forensic medicine and Post-mortem DNA analysis, restorative arts and archaeology. she is also a passionate plant lover.

Suzie cares for all our dead with utmost care and respect, and can support both natural mortuary care, home-funerals and the entire suite of mortuary care, including embalming for repatriation.

Chelsea Jones

Chelsea continues the Jones legacy at The Last Hurrah, as Nastassia and Mon’s first cousin. the youngest member of the team, she offers a youthful spirit and creative flair to our bespoke offerings. Chelsea gained her Masters of Architecture degree in Wellington, New Zealand, and relocated to Melbourne in 2023.

Chelsea also has experience as a freelance graphic designer, and working in childcare, and her greatest passion is supporting whanau and tamariki. During a wake, you’ll often find Chelsea entertaining the little ones with sports/games.

Since joining the Last Hurrah, Chelsea has been surprised by the beauty evident in death care, and has discovered how rewarding it is to provide support and care to families.

Cash Muscat

With a family background in caregiving, Cash, a final year social work student brings a warm, socially conscious approach to their role as a funeral director, and ceremony maker. Through their studies, Cash was struck by a common misconception: that Western culture lacks meaningful rituals around death. Working at Last Hurrah has solidified to Cash that these rituals are there, but we often miss or avoid them because of societal discomfort with death. This realization sparked Cash’s belief in connecting social work with funeral practice, through learning to recognise and reclaim these rituals, learning to live and walk with grief, and supporting community through deeply personal, healing practices.

As ceremony writer, Cash is passionate about how storytelling can make funerals deeply meaningful, bridging lives and memories in ways that offer comfort and preserve legacies. Cash sees storytelling as a vital ritual in honoring the deceased, one that allows families to remember, connect, and find purpose amid grief by reflecting on impactful moments and milestones.

A proud Thornbury local, Cash can often be found connecting with their community at the local bars, spending time with their soul mate Sukoshi (their seven-year-old cavoodle), or throwing clay as a hobby ceramicist. Cash is preparing for their final year of study, which includes a thesis exploring wellbeing and supervision models in the funeral industry, focusing on support strategies when working with grief and trauma. For Cash, each day spent offering insight, clarity, or simply a listening ear to families reinforces the importance and purpose of their work.

Cheryl and Sharon

These lovely ladies are a valuable part of the team. They enjoy judging passers by and cuddles on the couch.

 

The Last Hurrah Story

The Last Hurrah Funeral company has been a long time in the making. Its founders, Nastassia Jones and Kimba Griffith had each spent years working in and around the funeral industry, both feeling dismayed at the status quo, the facades and opacity of the providers tasked with one of life’s most important, heartwrenching, and defining moments: the way people farewell their dead.

Both women spent years imagining a different way, working on a model for funerals that was fair, authentic, and cost-effective, but each lacked one special ingredient: a partner who had the skills the other lacked. By some stroke of magic in mid 2018, the pair met in a funeral industry networking group, and almost immediately it was clear that here was the person the other had waited for.

Since that time, the pair have painstakingly worked to create a brand new model of funeral care, based on a model of transparency, flexibility, and deep respect for the journey death tasks each of us with. To farewell someone we love, to grapple with our own grief at a time where so much needs to be done, and to create an offering that makes authentic and beautiful funerals available to all. 

Nastassia and Kimba have built this model from the ground-up, with limited resources, and without the huge mechanisms that exist in the traditional corporate structure that sits behind the majority of funeral brands in Australia, and which ultimately drive funeral services to a homogeneous offering that removes families from the centre of the process. The Last Hurrah aims to place families and individuals at the very centre of all we do.

 

The Last Hurrah Funerals works across Metro Melbourne and across all of Victoria from Bendigo to Traralgon, Portsea to Wodonga and are funeral directors to folks in Brunswick, Coburg, Maribyrnong, Thornbury, Northcote, Reservoir, West Heidelberg, Clifton Hill, Fairfield, Castlemaine, Maldon, Bendigo, Hurstbridge and Moorabbin, but of course, we go everywhere.