Christmas means sipping hot choccy in front of the fireplace with your loved ones around you. But most of all, Christmas means gingerbread cookies! Now, there are some people who build gingerbread houses, which is all well and good. But have you ever tried making something… bigger?

Well, Swedish food artist and motion designer Caroline Eriksson has! And her creative ideas are much, much bigger than you’d expect when you hear the word ‘gingerbread.’

Every Christmas, she designs and bakes incredibly detailed (and delicious) gingerbread sculptures. This year, she made Groot from “Guardians of the Galaxy.” Which might even be more impressive than last year’s cool sculpture—the Xenomorph from “Alien.” Grab yourselves some gingerbread cookies, scroll down for Bored Panda’s interview with the artist, and enjoy.

And when you’re done ‘snacking’ on this post, check out our previous article about Caroline’s awesome Smaug sculpture from “The Hobbit.”

More info: Instagram | Caroline Eriksson

Here’s Caroline’s amazing Xenomorph gingerbread sculpture from last year

Caroline has baked sculpture artworks since 2013 when she won a Norwegian baking contest, and every year she surprises her fans with new and impressive edible art. It took the artist around 5 weeks to make Groot, and she had to add lots of syrup and flour to make the dough thick enough to support the sculpture. She even built the gingerbread sculpture around a metal frame to make sure that it wouldn’t collapse.

“I have been making gingerbread houses every year with my family since I was little,” the artist told Bored Panda. “After a few years, I got tired of houses and wanted to build other things, like boats, castles, and towers. My family didn’t have that patience but looked forward to seeing new works of art every year.”

“Then in 2013, I had moved to Norway and I entered a gingerbread contest where you could win 40,000 Norwegian kroner [4,505 dollars]. I had been thinking about building a robot for a while, taking houses and boats one step further! I thought it must be possible to do – if I started with very simple square inner forms and added details on top.”

“I had been thinking about building a robot for a while, taking houses and boats one step further! I thought it must be possible to do. If I started with very simple square inner forms and added details on top. Around this time a Transformers movie came out in theatres, and I decided to build Optimus Prime. It took 3 weeks but I got it done and was very happy with the beautiful sculpture.”

“I won the contest, and for the money, I took a trip to Bali. The transformer got viral and after that, I have continued to make unique artworks every Christmas. I try to challenge myself with every creation, do something more advanced that I haven’t seen been done before, push the boundaries for what can be done with this medium. That’s what I find most fun: to solve how to get the textures and shapes I want. But that is also what is most challenging and it takes a lot of time and testing to get right,” Caroline, who is from Stockholm but now lives in Norway, told us.

For this Christmas, Caroline made a gingerbread version of Groot from ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’

“It takes me around 5 weeks to make these creations. Groot and the Alien Xenomorph both took 5 weeks: one for planning and four to build! I start by finding a lot of references and come up with ideas of what I want to create. Then I make a 1:1 scale sketch that I use as a reference for building a simple inner form first to get the proportions right. Then I add more and more details on top.”

“I make my own dough to make it harder with a smoother surface, for that I use more syrup, flour, and no baking powder! It’s still good for eating though,” the artist told Bored Panda. “For every creation I use around 6 batches, which is probably 7kg of flour and 11 packets of sugar. I use melted sugar as glue as well, it hardens fast, is strong, lasts very long, and is edible!”

“My creations so far have been movie-related since I’m a big movie nerd, but I have ideas for game characters, ornaments, and houses as well. We will see what I create next!”

The artist has been making gingerbread sculptures since 2013

People love her art

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