About Gingerbread Template
A free generator of gingerbread house templates: pick a house and a size, and print every piece to scale with its measurements.
Who makes it
Gingerbread Template is built and run by an independent web developer. It is not a bakery or a shop, and it has no connection to the recipe sites it links to.
Why it exists
Most gingerbread house templates online are a PDF of one house in one size. If you want it bigger, smaller or on A4, you scale it on a copier and hope. Most of them also ignore the thickness of the dough, so the walls overlap at the corners and the roof doesn't quite reach. This site draws the template for the size you ask for and works the thickness into every joint.
How the templates are made
- Every piece is calculated in millimeters from the width, depth, wall height, roof pitch, overhang and dough thickness you choose. Nothing is copied from another template.
- The side walls stand between the front and back walls, so they are shorter than the house is deep by twice the thickness. That keeps the outside of the house exactly the size you entered.
- Before a change goes live, automated tests put every house type and size together in 3D and check that each pair of meeting edges lines up within 0.5 mm, that the walls stand on the right footprint, and that no window is closer than twice the thickness to an edge.
- Pieces are packed onto Letter or A4 with 10 mm margins. Pieces bigger than a sheet are split into parts with a 10 mm overlap and lettered alignment marks.
- Every sheet carries a check line, 2 in or 5 cm long, so you can see on paper that nothing was scaled. The PDF is vector, so lines stay sharp at any printer resolution.
Where the baking advice comes from
The site doesn't publish its own recipe yet. The advice about dough, baking, icing and decorating on these pages was checked against the sources below. They are also good recipes to start from.
- King Arthur Baking: Construction Gingerbread for Gingerbread Houses (opens in a new tab). A construction gingerbread recipe, its yield as a house size, and trimming pieces while warm.
- King Arthur Baking: How to make a gingerbread house (opens in a new tab). Dough thickness, paper patterns, cutting and trimming, baking until firm, the board, and building ahead when children decorate.
- King Arthur Baking: Royal Icing (opens in a new tab). Royal icing with meringue powder or pasteurized egg whites, and how long it takes to set.
- Food Network: Gingerbread House Dough (opens in a new tab). A gingerbread house dough recipe, baking and resting extra-large pieces, and melting candy for windows.
- Food Network Kitchen: Gingerbread for a Gingerbread House (opens in a new tab). A second house dough recipe: rolling thickness, chilling cut pieces and its yield.
- Food Network Kitchen: Light-Up Gingerbread House (opens in a new tab). Chilling cut pieces, candy glass windows, drying times and lighting a house with LED lights.
- Taste of Home: How to Make a Gingerbread House (opens in a new tab). Royal icing instead of frosting, propping walls with cans or jars, and the wait before the roof.
- The Old Farmer's Almanac: How to Make a Gingerbread House (opens in a new tab). Making pieces ahead, storing them, and what humidity does to gingerbread and icing.
- FDA: What You Need to Know About Egg Safety (opens in a new tab). Why raw egg whites need care, and pasteurized eggs for recipes served raw.
- ALDI UK: Mini Gingerbread House Mug Topper (opens in a new tab). Mug toppers: doorways in the front and back walls, and 3 mm dough.
- iLoveToCreate: Easy ideas to create a faux gingerbread look (opens in a new tab). White puffy paint as icing on cardboard houses.
What you won't find here
No houses from films, games or brands: those designs belong to their owners. No made-up reviews or ratings either. New house types are added only when they have their own geometry, worked out and tested like the rest.
Contact
Found a piece that doesn't fit, or want a house type that isn't here? Write to us and we'll answer by email.