This year's competition has 151 entries in three different categories. The first is architects, designers and (professional) bakers, the second is children up to age 12 and the third is "everyone else who bakes". There's also an audience prize awarded to the entry which receives the most votes from the public.
Entrants bake their houses at home and have to transport them to ArkDes themselves, and every part of the gingerbread house needs to be edible.
There's also a theme each year ‒ this year it's 'love', which means that there are a lot of hearts made of icing, sweets and glitter on this year's entries.
The exhibition will continue until January 11th, 2026, with the winner of Gingerbread House of the Year in each category announced on December 14th at 1pm.
Love takes many forms, with this one below celebrating the maker's love of stories like Pippi Longstocking (in the top right), Ronja and Birk from Ronja the Robber's Daughter and the love between siblings ‒ you can spot the Brothers Lionheart on the bridge in the bottom right hand corner.
The next entry, titled 'Home is where the heart is' has used marshmallows to make a snow-covered floor.
This entry celebrates the love of a pet, featuring Boba, the dog of the family who made the gingerbread house.
Fans of the Pixar film Up may recognise this next entry: a Christmassy version of the house from the film, complete with balloons sticking out of the chimney.
That wasn't the only entry inspired by a film. Another entrant expressed their love of the Studio Ghibli film Spirited Away to make a gingerbread bathhouse, complete with a mini version of the character No-Face standing by the front door.
This one features the tower in the film Tangled, with Rapunzel's hair hanging down from a tower so well-decorated that you can barely tell it's even made of gingerbread.
There were a number of people who made gingerbread houses inspired by real buildings, like this one of Katarina Norra school in Stockholm.
And this one, which fewer people are likely to recognise, a house in Lännersta which the family of the baker has lived in for 30 years.
This next one, featuring a bit of wallpaper, a light switch and part of a door frame, features the caption "when I turn the light on I can see your love, dad".
And here's another entry showing an apartment building on Kronobergsgatan in Stockholm.
Finally, this entry shows a Christmassy 'Love Shack', with two pairs of boots outside suggesting that there may be a couple within.
Comments