PHOTOS, VIDEO: Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort & Universal’s Aventura Hotel Present Adorable Annual Gingerbread House Competition

Spencer Lloyd

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uorgingerbreadhouses

PHOTOS, VIDEO: Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort & Universal’s Aventura Hotel Present Adorable Annual Gingerbread House Competition

This year, Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort and Universal’s Aventura Hotel is pitting each department of their hotels against each other in a gingerbread house contest, so naturally we stopped by to get a look at what everyone came up with! This year, everyone brought out their creative side to make some excellent (and even intricately detailed) holiday delights, so we’ll be showing you every single entrant.

Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort

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Displayed on a long table in the hotel lobby, guests are encouraged to vote for their two favorite houses in the ballot box on the end of the table.

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Housekeeping went with a huge duplex arrangement featuring one single-story, one double-decker, and a garage in the middle, all fully adorned with tons of icing and candy including jelly beans, gumdrops, Twizzlers, peach rings, and much more.

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Recreation was inspired by Cabana Bay’s pool and lazy river, complete with Sour Patch Kids acting as beachgoers, chewing gum lounge chairs, popcorn and almond rocks, and brown sugar sand.

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The front office team came out with a North Pole look, complete with Santa’s sleigh, a train, and three structures adorned with icing and candy. In this one, people were represented by Peeps.

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While the culinary department may not have gone as big as the other departments did, theirs sure is one of the most simple and visually appealing. Sticking with the idea of a house, they lined the vertices with gumdrops and hard candies to give the house a consistent color pattern.

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Security was extremely creative while sticking to a simple idea, with a dinosaur (presumably from Jurassic Park) destroying their hard-built house!

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Leave it to the Engineering department to create a simple, elegant design featuring tons of color.

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Beverage may have the most aesthetically pleasing house of all, with a log cabin-style created by using pretzel sticks on all sides of the house and very neat icing patterns on the roof. Combine that with the pretzel and icing trees in the back, the little campfire next to the house, and the fact that the house itself is presented on a log(!!) and you have a great contender for top house.

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Stewarding’s house may not be the visual masterpiece of its neighbor, but it certainly makes up for that in the amount of sweets used. And let’s be honest, we all end up with a gingerbread house like this a few times in our life.

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Bayliner made a five-structure village for their entry, featuring four houses and a reindeer barn. Each featuring distinct designs and ornamentation makes this a lovely entrant.

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Starbucks’ entry is quite the cavity-inducer, with tons of donuts, sprinkles, and powdered sugar to make this a holiday treat your dentist won’t soon forget. There’s even a giant Christmas tree at the center!

Universal’s Aventura Hotel

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Just like at Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort, the entrants are lined up along a long table in the lobby.

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The front office team went all-out on the references, theming their three houses to past attractions at Universal Orlando Resort, including Nickelodeon Studios, “Beetlejuice’s Graveyard Revue”, JAWS, and Dueling Dragons, TWISTER: Ride it Out!, and Back to the Future.

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The Nickelodeon Studios house features plenty of orange icing and green slime both from the house and on the front walk.

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The “Beetlejuice’s Graveyard Revue” house is all purple and orange on the front with a green roof.

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This house pays tribute to the attractions of yore at Universal Studios Florida and Islands of Adventure, including Twister: Ride it Out!, Back to the Future: The Ride, JAWS, and Dueling Dragons. There’s also a churro section on the front.

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Storeroom and HR went in on the Grinch theme together, decorating their house with green everywhere. There’s even a partly destroyed Christmas tree and a nod to his dog Max.

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Out of all the houses, Engineering may be among the absolute prettiest, with such a pleasing exterior, perfectly manicured roof, and even some mistletoe and poinsettia adorning the front roof.

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Better prepare for another trip to the dentist with the Finance/Exec Office entry. There’s tons of icing, Mentos, marshmallows, sprinkles, and even more icing! Santa’s sleigh and chocolate reindeer on the roof is certainly a nice touch as well.

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Food and Beverage went in together at Aventura, with a simple house featuring a KitKat roof, gumdrops atop, and snow made of marshmallows.

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Culinary went the same route as Food and Beverage, presenting a Kit Kat-roofed house with tons of candy, chocolate, sprinkles, and even an icing Christmas tree at the front.

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Security came out swinging with this also perfectly-manicured home featuring intricate icing details, a precise roof pattern, grounds made of green rice krispies, and even little window designs!

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Housekeeping’s home at Aventura follows a simple red and green color scheme that keeps things organized and visually appealing while sparing no icing and candy.

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True to their name, Recreation’s entry features the beach, complete with cocoa powder sand, chewing gum towels, mint life rafts, and candy cane trees.

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Stewarding sure went the extra mile, putting their name in the structure itself rather than having a paper written for it. They’ve got two extremely large icing Christmas trees flanking a very blue house with plenty of red and green accents. Clean icing all around along with the graham cracker fence and intricate icicles makes this another top contender for sure!

You can stop by Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort and Universal’s Aventura Hotel to take a peep at these houses for yourself and vote on your favorites. You can also let us know in the comments which ones you loved and how jealous you are of their decorating skills!

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