The palatial interiors of Waddesdon Manor, a Rothschild mansion in Buckinghamshire stuffed with treasures once owned by emperors and queens – and now owned by the National Trust – have been recreated in gingerbread and sugar icing for Christmas.
The miniature rooms are detailed down to the Sevres and Meissen porcelain set out on the dining room table for a banquet, the festoons of silk brocade in the grandest bedroom where Queen Victoria took a nap, and the views of 18th-century Venice by Francesco Guardi on the panelled walls of the east gallery.
The two-metre-long gingerbread Waddesdon is the creation of Biscuiteers, whose previous work includes a panorama of lost buildings of London such as the Euston Arch and Old London Bridge, made for Selfridges’ Christmas windows in 2013, and a selection of gingerbread books presented last year to Harper Lee, to mark the launch of Go Set a Watchman, 55 years after her last book.
The ingredients for their latest creation included 30kg of butter and 216kg of icing.
Waddesdon was built by Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild in the 1870s in the style of a French renaissance chateau as a setting for his extraordinary art collections, which included furniture owned by Marie Antoinette and a carpet from Versailles.
The mansion has been lavishly decorated for Christmas – something that never happened in the days of Waddesdon’s creator. The property, with installations by the light sculptor Bruce Munro, will be open until 2 January.
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