Photos by Karen Fien
The Gruver family of Greece loves to build Gingerbread Houses. Each year, since 2006, they have created a Gingerbread House for the George Eastman Museum’s Sweet Creations Gingerbread Display.
The process of building the gingerbread house is truly a team effort, involving the entire Gruver family, Mother, Andrea; Father, Bud; daughters Meagan and Faith and Son, Andrew.
Andrea is a mechanical engineer and handles the design each year. She said, “Designing the houses is a way for me to do an artsy thing along with using my design skills.” Bud and Andrew handle the roof work. Daughters help with the the sides of the house, which are fully decorated while laying flat, and then assembled. The entire family assists with the assembly, with Andrea attending to the fine details. “I’m a perfectionist,” she said. It takes nine to ten days to complete the house, five of those days involve intense decorating.
The Gruver’s gingerbread creation for this year is called, “The Merry Merlot Chateau.” The design is the result of Andrea’s creative online research seeking out photos of French wineries. She said, “I know my own skill sets, what I can, and cannot replicate. I modify the reference photos to accommodate my design.”
Andrea has acquired some very useful information over her thirty plus years of building and designing gingerbread houses. She said, “Keep the theme general, with low key colors that last the season.”
The Eastman House calls The Gruver family creation for this year “spectacular” and named it one of their featured houses for 2022. Last year the Gruver’s gingerbread house, “Winter Wonderland,” was an imaginative house created all in white. It set an all-time silent auction record price of $610.
Sweet Creations Gingerbread Houses are on display thru January 1, 2023 at the George Eastman Museum. The museum’s website describes this year’s display as, “Dozens of cleverly designed, and deliciously decorated, gingerbread houses filling the mansion. This beloved holiday tradition provides a visual and aromatic treat for visitors of all ages.”
All of the Sweet Creations gingerbread houses are available for purchase in an online silent auction. The auction ends on January 1, 2023 at 5PM. For complete auction details go to https://www.eastman.org/sweet-creations-gingerbread-display-0
