Pastry shops are displaying their buns uncovered – just don’t bite the merchandise

Despite messy T-shirts and the occasional mouthful of styrofoam, open-air pastry displays are on the rise in Australia. Why? ‘Aesthetics’ Buns that bare all, and eclairs exposed to air: in Australia, a new wave of pastry shops are doing more than baking and selling their creations – they’re displaying them, in single units, completely uncovered. You’ll find them on counters, risers, concrete slabs, shiny surfaces, and mini podiums, minus glass or Perspex barriers, like mini art exhibits. This is pastries en plein air. But if the cardinal rule of art galleries is “do not touch the exhibits”, for baked goods, it’s “don’t eat them either”. At Tokyo Lamington in Carlton, Melbourne, the open-air lamingtons are fashioned from Styrofoam, double-coated in real chocolate, and placed on a tiered display at the front counter – yet customers have been known to take a bite out of them. “People are pretty feral sometimes,” says co-owner Eddie Stewart. At Cafe Lewi in Sydney’s inner west, several sweet and savoury pastries line the counter. A vintage buttercream cake, their most elaborately decorated specimen, also occupies the most vulnerable position on the corner.