Scotland Sculptor Turns Food into Art
In the town of Kirkcudbright in Scotland is a curious little shop where not everything is as it seems. From crispy pies to shining jellies and soft ice cream, the shop is filled with delicious-looking food — only none of it is edible.
Created by award-winning sculptor and fake food artist Kerry Samantha Boyes, the Fake Food Workshop is a place to enjoy the art of food without consuming a single calorie.
Kerry, who crafts each food product available at the shop, isn't your usual chef. The ingredients she uses include materials like resin, clay and foam. Sometimes, real food is used to make silicone molds, from which a fake copy is created and then painted to look lifelike.
But Kerry's talent for creating fake food didn't begin in the kitchen.
Having trained in sculpture at university, Kerry worked in stone carving before later training in taxidermy — the art of stuffing animals for display.
Kerry says her training in taxidermy helped her understand animal anatomy, which is useful when building something like a cooked goose or a roast pig for a display.
Some of Kerry's work involves recreating historical food, which she creates for museums and organizations like English Heritage and the UK's National Trust.
However, some of her more modern projects have included making fake ice cream for the 2023 Barbie movie, and a jelly with a gun inside it for the Netflix series The Gentlemen.
"Sometimes the most complicated things to make are the simple things," she told us. "For instance a cucumber sandwich. The bread needs to look light and bouncy. The cream cheese needs to be smooth and well, creamy and the cucumbers should look fresh."
Working out how to put different textures together is often one of Kerry's biggest challenges. But she says it's challenges like these that make the job fun!
