Western Morning News (Saturday)
Artist has designs on halloween pumpkins
A PROFESSIONAL pumpkin carver from the South West has shared her top tips for carving the perfect pumpkin this Halloween – and why you shouldn’t light a tealight inside it.
Szimonetta Zombori, 30, works year round as a professional fruit artist – but Halloween is her favourite time of the year.
The mother-of-two carves intricate designs on pumpkins, including well-known faces such as the Mona Lisa and Frankenstein, for up to £200 per design.
Szimonetta, from Bournemouth, Dorset, said you should never “just wing it” when it comes to your design and should map it out first to get the best result.
The artist also warned against an easy mistake people make; putting a real lit tealight in the pumpkin.
She explained some people don’t realise this actually starts to cook the pumpkin so it goes off faster. The best thing to do is to get a small LED tea light instead.
She said: “For me, when coming up with a design I always look around me and see if I can find something for inspiration. I always try to find challenging designs to try out for myself each year.”
Szimonetta completed a stone sculpting course in 2014 after leaving school, but quickly discovered she had a passion for a more unusual medium – food. Although pumpkins are one of Szimonetta’s favourite canvasses, she can create art from nearly any food – including watermelons, cheese, broccoli and even avocado.
For intricate designs she favours a linoleum cutter to scrape off layers without going all the way through the flesh into the hollow centre. And she says keeping the pumpkin moist ensures it remains “workable”. She added: “When I finish with the carving then I wrap with clingfilm, and remove it only before display.”