UMA creates hut out of thousands of gingerbread cookies just in time for christmas

UMA builds edible gingerbread hut

during the end of the year, immense amounts of gingerbread cookies are produced and shipped out to every local grocery store in sweden. the cookies are both intended as an edible product as well as an ornamental one since many use them as christmas decorations. meanwhile, it is also very common for people to buy small building sets with walls, roofs, and chimneys so they can create their own little gingerbread house at home.

as the holiday season approaches, and with this festive food as their main inspiration, ulf mejergren architects (UMA) decided to explore what can be done when using gingerbread cookies on a larger scale. the result of their investigation is an edible hut, made of thousands of gingerbread cookies. 

the backside

all images courtesy of ulf mejergren architects (UMA)

heart-shaped cookies generate an interesting hut interior

although it was tempting to bake and form every building part for this hut, UMA bought pre-made cookies which are perfectly identical. the team cut up an old garden hose to use as a frame, creating two large interconnected discs. these slanted structures lean towards each other at the top, and gradually get wider at the base, becoming both the walls and the roof of the hut. the frame also has four legs of rebar, which the architects inserted into the ground to make the construction sturdier. 

using typical heart-shaped cookies, the architects decided to use a glue gun to paste the hearts together instead of their initial idea to use melted sugar, since it would not do very well due to the low temperatures.  since there is no support behind the cookies except for the discs, the facades soon got wavy and unintentionally parametric, giving the structure quite a complex look. the gaps between the hearts make for a pretty interesting interior since there are basically hundreds of small windows to peak out through. in UMA’s first attempt to make the hut it was so humid in the air that the cookies soon became soft and collapsed, so the team had to make another hut when the air was much drier. the gingerbread hut experienced another collapse a couple of days later when local animals discovered that it could be eaten.

the entrance

front facade

close up of the hut

the interior where one can gaze out through thousands of windows

diagram of the creation of gingerbread hut

project info:

name: gingerbread hut
designer: ulf mejergren architects (UMA)
location: sweden

designboom has received this project from our ‘DIY submissions‘ feature, where we welcome our readers to submit their own work for publication. see more project submissions from our readers here.

edited by: myrto katsikopoulou | designboom