Pie? Or Art.

On our way home from a farm visit, my produce sales rep showed me a picture of the most intricately designed pie I had ever seen and asked me if it was edible. It seemed so although I guessed the crust was likely shortening-based to withstand that much carving and physical manipulation. The photo was of a pie designed by @lokokitchen, an Instagram account manned by Lauren Ko, “an artist, writer, and self-taught baker” based in Seattle, Washington. Intrigued by the prospect of a tasty and good lookin’ pie, I set about finding where I could buy one of these pies and how much they would cost. Just kidding. There is no storefront and these pies are not for sale. In fact, they barely exist because as plentiful as those pie designs are, I could hardly find a picture of the baked pie. What I did find was a hashtag titled #yeahbutwhatdoesitlooklikebaked.

The answer was very underwhelming and begs the question: what’s the point? This is not to take away from Ms. Ko’s talent which has amassed over 200K followers on Instagram and been featured in O Magazine. But why trouble oneself and labor for hours to create such an impressive design when it doesn’t look as appetizing after baking? Isn’t a pie meant to be eaten? Art, this is. Pie, it is not.