Hannalee Pervan and her mother, Catherine Pervan, who co-own One House Bakery in Benicia, California, spent weeks moulding, baking and assembling the life-size sculpture using wood and two types of dough, including a yeastless dough with a higher sugar content to make it last longer.

The two worked during the night once the day’s business was finished and lovingly crafted Han Solo’s anguished face and his hands reaching out.

“Mom made me leave it because I was obsessing over the lips,” Hannalee Pervan told the New York Times. “She was like, ‘You need to walk away.’”

Creating Pan Solo was particularly meaningful, she told the paper, because she contracted COVID-19 in January 2021 and lost her sense of smell and taste.

“So just to find joy in a different part of food is really important,” she said.

The sculpture is now displayed outside the bakery, approximately half an hour’s drive north of San Francisco.

Pan Solo is the bakery’s entry in the annual Downtown Benicia Main Street Scarecrow Contest. The public will get to vote on their favourites from more than two dozen creations entered by local businesses.

The Pervans, who are big science-fiction and fantasy fans, entered another Star Wars-themed creation in 2020 featuring the Mandalorian and Baby Yoda.

Unfortunately, Pan Solo won’t last forever. The dough will eventually be composted, not eaten.