I get a lot of design inspiration from real-world objects. Combine that with my habit of roaming around aimlessly on the Internet and it seems I was destined to stumble across Etsy. I fall in love with lots of things I see there, like this pillow from PillowPallooza. And while most people who fall in love with a pillow think “I must have that!” my first thought is always “I must make that into a cake!” So I did.
Photo courtesy of Ashleigh Taylor Photography.
The Knot Best of Weddings (2008)
Inside Weddings (Winter 2011)
Southern California Brides (Fall-Winter 2007)
I considered entitling this post “Two Cakes I Love”, but thought better of it for fear of sounding boastful. I am extremely critical of my work (and, I like to think, quite humble), so it’s rare for me to say I love one of my cakes, let alone two. Truth be told, however, I love both of these cakes. There. I said it.
Both were inspired by invitations found on Wedding Paper Divas, and photographed by Ashleigh Taylor of Ashleigh Taylor Photography.
For the first cake, based on the Floral Ring invite (below), I cut fondant into the same shapes found on the invitation (roses, leaves, and a large circle for the monogram) and dried them overnight. I used a black food coloring pen to outline each shape, to draw the veins on the leaves, and to write the initials on the monogram. The roses are colored with a mix of food coloring paste and powder. I also added some detail directly onto the cake using food coloring pens. The cutouts are adhered to the cake using edible glue (a mix of gum tragacanth and water).
I used the same fondant cutout technique for the second cake (below), based on the Artistic Maple: Autumn Orange invitation.
When I took my first cake design class in 1996, I was taught that wedding cake tiers must increase in diameter by 4″ increments. A 6″ cake must sit atop a 10″ cake on top of a 14″ cake, etc. Of course, being the consummate rule follower, I adhered strictly to these guidelines, straying only occasionally into 3″ increments (6″ on 9″ on 12″), but never, EVER, less than 3″. Frankly, it never occurred to me that it could be done any other way. Height? A standard 4″. Always. And wedding cake color? Duh.
That all changed for me in 2005 when I discovered the work of April Reed. She was new to the scene from what I could tell, but her work was so different, so avant garde, and she was so clearly NOT a rule follower, that I was smitten (and, I’ll admit, jealous) immediately. I had never even seen cakes that increased by only 1-inch in diameter, like this one:
I had never even considered that cakes could have varying heights, like this one:
Or this one:
Or this one:
A black cake? The thought never entered my mind.
And a cake covered in truffles? Really?
I remember staring at her website for hours, drooling over her designs, and lusting over her creativity. And I wasn’t the only one who noticed. In 2009, Abby Larson, editor of the popular wedding blog Style Me Pretty, called April Reed the “queen of all things gorgeous” and credited her for being “the cake designer that has inspired SO many trends, SO many different cake styles.” According to Ms. Larson, April Reed “literally redefined what a wedding cake should look like.” I completely agree. In a very short time, April Reed was tremendously influential. I’m sure you can see the influence she had on me here:
And here:
Not to mention here:
And, of course, here:
Whether her style was derived from a lack of professional training or a keen design sensibility makes no difference. Ultimately, April Reed changed the game, and had an enormous influence on me and countless others. Thank you, Ms. Reed, from the bottom of my heart, for your ingenuity, inspiration, and fearless disregard for convention. Wherever you are, I hope that you are well.
Read MoreI’ve been going a little (okay, a lot) crazy with cake bunting lately. I first saw it on Etsy, when Charla, my friend and colleague, requested it for her daughter Brooklyn’s second birthday party cake. It seems that now there’s been a proliferation of cake bunting on Etsy, but this artist remains my favorite. This one is particularly cute:
I also stumbled across this fiesta bunting one day on Eat Drink Pretty.
Anyway, when I saw that cake bunting I loved it–loved it!–and decided to make my own. The only difference is that I make mine out of fondant. I use two lollipop sticks and tie the ribbon to each. Fondant does not like to stick to ribbon, so now when I make cake bunting I actually back each fondant piece with a smaller piece of fondant, wet them both with water or egg white so they adhere, and sandwich the ribbon in between. Here are some of my recent cakes with fondant bunting.
For a baby shower:
50th Birthday with Fiesta Theme:
Second Birthday Party:
Halloween:
I wrote this article for Nick and Aleah Valley of Valley and Co., a wedding and event planning company in San Diego. While they were vacationing in New York, they posted it on their blog. Here I’m calling it Part II, because the first installment of “The Wedding Cake: Big Dreams on a Small Budget” appeared here back in April.
In today’s tough economy, many couples understandably look to save on the cost of their wedding cake. Savvy brides and grooms know that the more detail and labor the cake design requires, the more expensive the cake will be. Eliminating or changing design elements can significantly reduce the cost, but you might be surprised to learn which details take the longest. Try to identify the most labor intensive element of each cake below. Then scroll down to check your answers.
Cake 1: Winter white houndstooth pattern
Cake 2: Square off-set with succulents
Cake 3: Sugarpaste flower
Cake 4: Fondant fruits with Envelopments graphics
Cake 5: Lotus flower
Cake 6: Sugared hearts
Did you guess correctly? Read below to find out the most time-consuming elements of each cake.
Cake 1: Star ornament. The houndstooth pattern looks deceptively intricate, but it’s actually a stencil and is quite simple to reproduce. The hand-cut star ornament, on the other hand, requires precise cuts and lots of time. Eliminate the ornament and you’ve significantly reduced the cost of your cake without sacrificing design.
Cake 2: Fondant succulents. At first glance the off-set tiers might look like an architectural nightmare, but stacking the tiers is relatively simple compared to the succulents. This wedding cake was originally designed by the groom (husband to Carissa of JL Designs) and made by Vanilla Bake Shop. The only thing that makes our cake different from the original is that we made all the succulents out of edible gumpaste, a very labor intensive process. The expense of this cake could easily be reduced by swapping the edible succulents for inexpensive real ones.
Cake 3: Custom leaf work. Sugarpaste flowers are undeniably time consuming, but each petal is cut using a purchased cutter, saving the designer time. The leaves on this cake, created to match an invitation from Wedding Paper Divas, had to be cut by hand, which takes a lot longer. Replace the hand-cut leaves with fondant leaves cut with a cutter and you’ve saved your baker a lot of time, saving you money in turn.
Cake 4: Fondant fruits. Although the subtle sutra pattern (from Envelopments) that surrounds each tier would take endless amounts of time to create by hand, here they are done on an edible ink printer. The edible fruits are the most labor intensive element of this cake. Use real fruits to decrease the time spent, thereby decreasing your cake’s price tag.
Cake 5: Olive colored fondant. Yes, the lotus flower was cut by hand, and yes the teardrops had to be hand appliquéd, but coloring large quantities of fondant–especially to match a specific color–takes time. Fondant can be purchased pre-colored, but it’s more expensive than white. To save money, opt for white fondant and introduce pops of color.
Cake 6: Square shape. Icing a cake so that the edges and corners are perfectly square takes years of practice and a lot of time. Some bakers even charge more for square cakes. To cut costs on your cake, you’ll want to literally cut corners and go for a round cake.
Remember, there are many cost effective ways to simplify your wedding cake without sacrificing design. So, before you replace the sugar flowers with real ones, consider the other ways to save your baker time–and save your budget.
Photo Credits. Cake 1: Ashleigh Taylor; Cake 2: Jordana Hazel; Cake 3, 5, and 6: Cory OBrien; Cake 4: Henry Chen
Charla Brummel, of Charla Blue Photography, recently had a 2nd birthday party for her adorable daughter Brooklyn. The theme of the party was inspired by, believe it or not, an Ikea quilt. To translate the design into cake, I made individual panels, some using edible images and others that were stenciled, and fondant ric rac. (I’ll be posting a how-to on the fondant ric rac soon.) I’m on a major cake bunting kick, so I added an edible bunting topper. Charla says she’s not creative, but as you can see from the table she designed (not to mention her artistic photographs), she lies.
This is Brooklyn:
And these are pictures of her party:
And as if you couldn’t tell by all the pictures, I really liked the cake.
At first, we sort of made fun of my friend Brian when he went to ice cream college. Brian, along with his wife Jackie, owns Ample Hills Creamery, an artisan ice cream company in Brooklyn, NY.
As it turns out, ice cream school has nothing to do with the fun stuff, like mastering the art of the perfect scoop or the correct combination of toppings for a banana split. Instead, the focus is on the science of ice cream. I love blueberries–they’re my favorite fruit–but when I tried making blueberry ice cream, all I got was blueberry-flavored ice crystals. The problem, Brian learned, was the ratio of cream to water. Blueberries have a high water content, so more fat (i.e., cream) is needed to balance out the ratio. The value of Brian’s newly acquired knowledge is that he can now create his own ice cream flavors.
