Gingerbread | Victorian, Decorative & Ornamental (2024)

FAQs

What is the gingerbread-style of architecture? ›

gingerbread, in architecture and design, elaborately detailed embellishment, either lavish or superfluous. Although the term is occasionally applied to highly detailed and decorative styles, it is more often applied specifically to the work of American designers of the late 1860s and '70s.

Gingerbread is an architectural style that consists of elaborately detailed embellishment known as gingerbread trim. It is more specifically used to describe the detailed decorative work of American designers in the late 1860s and 1870s, which was associated mostly to the Carpenter Gothic style.

Gingerbread trim is the general term that includes all the ornate embellishments found on Victorian, Carpenter Gothic, and Ontario Cottage-style homes.

Gingerbread-style houses are the epitome of charm and whimsy, featuring their trademark gingerbread trim. Gingerbread trim can be “fancifully cut and pierced frieze boards, scrolled brackets, sawn balusters, and braced arches,” writes Marjorie E.

The tradition of making decorated gingerbread houses is generally said to have started in Germany in the early 1800s, despite the existence of records that seem to indicate that gingerbread houses have been around since Ancient Egypt.

Long before it became a holiday treat, gingerbread was a royal favorite, a token of fertility, and a tool for witches to exact their vengeance. The pudgy gingerbread man with his candy eyes and icing smile has a sinister backstory—a link to death and the demonic.

The tradition survived in colonial North America, where the pastries were baked as ginger snap cookies and gained favour as Christmas tree decorations. The tradition of making decorated gingerbread houses started in Germany in the early 1800s.

After the Brothers Grimm wrote the story of Hansel and Gretel, Germans began to make gingerbread houses just like the one in the story. They called the finished house a Lebkuchenhaus or Pfefferkuchenhaus.

Gingerbread House is a brassy, ambered gold and part of our Yellows Collection. Inspired by the treasured holiday activity of making gingerbread houses, try this hue in a dining room or den for a cozy atmosphere paired with warm woods and accents.

What holds gingerbread houses together the best? ›

Fit Everything Together with Melted Sugar or Royal Icing

The second way is to use burnt sugar as your glue. Just melt C&H® Pure Granulated Cane Sugar in a pan on the stove, dip the gingerbread parts in and hold them together for a few seconds. Then, presto! You've created a solid house.

Needing to be foiled, gingerbread loves whipped cream. But it also takes to tart winter fruits like a shortcake to strawberries. Poached or broiled pineapple sings alongside gingerbread, as do a few spoonfuls of pomelo curd, garnished with candied pomelo peel.

Make your house lighter and brighter by swapping gingerbread dough with a firm funfetti cookie dough and decorating with pastel treats like butter mints. If you're sticking with traditional gingerbread dough, pastel icing and candy still add a sweet and cheery touch.

We suggest you just use a regular cookie pan and then add the greenery you think will match the best. Then, set the house on top. Serving Tray — Another traditional option, a serving tray is a great way to display your gingerbread house safely and in festive style.

Iraqi British architect Zaha Hadid became famous for her intensely futuristic style characterized by curving façades, sharp angles, and severe materials such as concrete and steel.

Soviet architecture usually refers to one of three architecture styles emblematic of the Soviet Union: Constructivist architecture, prominent in the 1920s and early 1930s. Stalinist architecture, prominent in the 1930s through 1950s. Brutalist architecture, prominent style in the 1950s through 1980s.

As the story goes, Googie got its name when the architecture critic Douglas Haskell was driving around Los Angeles researching a story about all the new splashy coffee shops he spied in the city. He saw Googies, a West Hollywood coffee shop with a bold red roof, and decided to name the style after it.

Today, the ultimate Christmas gingerbread incarnation is of course the gingerbread house. It has been suggested that these edible structures originated in Germany between the 16th and 18th centuries.