Confession: I have an unabashed obsession with fake food. Over the years, I've collected dozens of scrumptious-looking inedible objects and my ever-expanding collection is nestled on a shelf in my kitchen. The delectable phony nosh span all sorts of materials and provenances. There's a Murano glass lemon I purchased in Venice; the glossy, startlingly realistic cube of steak and piece of a yellowtail-and-scallion sushi roll that my sister brought me from Tokyo; a fuzzy plastic kiwi I haggled for in Singapore. (Okay, perhaps I'm slightly obsessed.)
But save for a pair of dangly maki-spangled earrings from Claire's that I bought, because, well, fake food was involved — namely sushi (not for the authenticity factor, since you can barely discern what they even are) — I haven't seen any wearable fake food items. That's about to change, thanks to ii-Fake, an array of accessories from Japanese company Fake Food Hatanaka, which Grub Street so kindly brought to my attention (and news site RocketNews24 spotted originally).
Remarkably real-looking faux food is big business in Japan, but making these painstakingly detailed and utterly mouthwatering (oh, and pretty pricey) items into accessories is pure genius, IMO. Each ii-Fake accessory will run you between $25 to $65 for jewelry and hair accessories to a whopping $268 for rain boots adorned with orange slices.
A bacon bangle, perhaps? Maybe some spam musubi earrings? How about a bolognese-topped necklace? Yeah, my fake food and jewelry collections have both clearly been missing all of those aforementioned items, along with the rest of ii-Fake's delicious-looking creations.
If you're hell-bent on an appetite-stoking headpiece, well, you're apparently not the only one. Most of ii-Fake's extensive selection of headbands are currently sold out. We'll be waiting patiently for our chance to snag some coif-topping French toast or okonomiyaki.