Syd Mead's Gingerbread Castle

Designer and artist Syd Mead worked with many companies to create the look of the modern world, but he is best known for designing the futuristic looks of movies such as Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Blade Runner, Tron, 2010, Short Circuit, and Aliens, among others. Mead died in 2019 at the age of 86.

One of the things Mead did in his spare time was making gingerbread structures. The Syd Mead Archive found a video that they labeled as from 1990, but Mead himself introduces it as for "the 1992-91 Christmas and New Year's season." At any rate, this is no ordinary gingerbread house. It's a fantasy castle designed the way you'd expect Mead to do it. He sketched the architectural plans, then made a prototype of foamcore. Only when the design was right did he bake gingerbread. In the video, he shows us how to make curved walls by working quickly with hot gingerbread before it turns crispy, using his foamcore prototype as a mold. Everything is thoroughly iced and decorated, even the trees. The finished castle is quite stunning. (via Boing Boing)