A Very Modern Wedding Cake!

Ashley was a very brave bride who wanted something a little more modern than most wedding cakes I've done. Okay... a lot more modern than most of my wedding cakes :) This square cake was different heights for each tier and the cakes were not centered (on purpose, of course!). She showed me a pattern that she was using in the wedding of these black and white flowers and so I came up with a few sketches. I mimicked those black and white flowers in the design and then brought in 2 much larger flowers for pops of color.

The couple ordered Chocolate Peanut Butter No-Cup Cake, Tuxedo Cake, and Almond Joy Cake. It's all covered in marshmallow fondant and then I hand painted the black and white flowers. For the larger flowers, I used different sized round cutters, created petals by carving out pieces of the flower and then used a pattern tracing wheel to create the lines in each petal. When I painted the flowers (one in teal and one in red), the grooves of the pattern tracing wheel created deeper colors than the flower itself, which I loved! I made a rounded yellow center and then used round piping tips to create a pattern on the centers as well.

Thank you, Ashley, for trusting me with your vision!! :) I loved making this cake!

Animal Print Birthday Cake!

Zeth wanted a "super girlie" birthday cake for his wife. He knew it should be about shopping, purses, shoes and knew she wanted animal print, pink, and black. We came up with this design together. There are 4 separate cakes here and everything else is made out of sugar.

I made this high heel out of gumpaste and waited till it dried before painting on the leopard print. The box underneath was also cake with a hand-painted leopard design. The zebra print shopping bag in the back was so much fun because making tissue paper out of sugar is actually super easy! Roll out your fondant (marshmallow fondant in this cake) very thin. Cut into different size squares and rectangles. Bunch up some plastic wrap and place on a cookie sheet. Now, lay the squares and rectangles over the plastic wrap so that they are taking on the shape of the valleys and hills of the plastic. Let them dry over night and then you'll have  sugar tissue paper :)

This purse cake was covered in white marshmallow fondant and then I painted it black so that it would keep its shine. I dried the purse strap over a round piece of styrofoam until it was hardened and then it stood up on its own. I made the bow and flowers out of marshmallow fondant as well. I used a pattern tracing wheel to create the stitched look on the purse itself. So simple but gives it a really nice detail. The square cake behind it has a sugar bow and a stenciled buttercream design on the sides.

The cakes were 24-Carrot Cake, Brownie Lovers, Cookies & Cake, and White Raspberry Kiss Cake. Yum!

Twilight Birthday Cake

I don't know much about Twilight but I do know there are some die-heart fans out there! I've done a few Twilight themed cakes in the past and this time we went with a different idea. Geysan had some of Valeria's favorite quotes from the book and so I wrote them all around the cake. I used the iconic chess pieces, apple, flowers, and ribbon from the books too. The cake was After Dinner Mint Cake and Snow white Cake (see my whole flavor list at www.SaltCakeCity.com). Ah, Team Edward, Team Jacob? I don't know but love to make the cakes for them!

Purple Zebra and Flowers!

Here comes an adorable story! Wendy emailed me and said her birthday was coming up and wanted to get a cake from me since she had some of her friend's wedding cake a while back and loved the flavor (Tuxedo cake, one layer of chocolate and 2 layers of vanilla cake layered with chocolate and vanilla buttercream and mini chocolate chips). Her request was to have a purple cake, maybe zebra stripes with colorful flowers on it. We planned it all out and came up with this design:

 That same week, I got a request from Sean for a purple cake with a black design on it and pretty flowers on it. He requested Tuxedo cake too, same specifications of 1 layer of chocolate, 2 vanilla, and mini chocolate chips! I thought it was strange but made it anyway and we came up with this design:

Turns out, Sean is Wendy's boyfriend who wanted to surprise her with a cake for her birthday! Wendy ended up with 2 Tuxedo cakes both in purple with flowers on it. I was pretty impressed at how well Sean did with describing what Wendy wanted. When Wendy came to get the surprise cake that Sean ordered, I asked if she still wanted it since she had just picked up the other one. She laughed and said of course, more cake for her! :) haha.

All Draped Wedding Cake

This 3-tiered wedding cake was all draping with bunches of fresh purple and white flowers. When Monica told me what she wanted, I was a little skeptical. Okay, I was REALLY skeptical. I was afraid that the full draping wouldn't look right. I'm glad we went forward with the concept though because I ended up loving this design. This was a 6-10-14 inch round cake but it doesn't look as big as it actually was. The wedding cake was covered in all marshmallow fondant and then I placed toothpicks where the fresh flowers needed to go.

The wedding was held at the Capital Building in Salt Lake City, which was a journey in and of itself! I had to deliver 3 wedding cakes that day so I was on a time crunch. We pulled up to the back of the building and went inside to scope out the location. It was upstairs and quite a bit away from where we were parked (illegally parked, I should mention) so I knew we wouldn't be able to carry the cake that far. I searched down a caterer to ask if they had a push cart we could use... and 30 minutes later, we finally had one. We slowly rolled the cake over to the reception area (every bump in the tile flooring was exaggerated with the cake on this push card) and my hubby ran back to the car to move it since we were parked illegally... outside of the Capital Building. Haha. Ironic. Anyway, I was trying to put the flowers on as quickly as possible since I heard the music starting and all of the wedding guests were awaiting the bride's walk down the stairs (it's nerve racking finishing a cake with a crowd of people surrounding you). I finished the look, snapped off some pictures, and ran away as fast as I could to see if we had a parking ticket (luckily we didn't). Phew! The cake turned out better than I could have ever imagined.

The top was Lemon raspberry cake, the middle was Smore's Cake and the bottom was Ruby Red Velvet cake. All marshmallow fondant draping... and it was HEAVY! haha. One more thing. When making this cake, it was quite possibly one of the ugliest cakes I've ever made until the put the flowers on it. It looked naked... and sad. Once those flowers were on though, gorgeoud! :)

Red & Orange Cherry Blossom Cake

Rissa & Jasper were having a fall wedding but knew they wanted a cherry blossom flower cake so we joined the two ideas and came up with this red & orange cherry blossom wedding cake. The branches and flowers are all sugar as well! They chose Truffled Chocolate Cake and Tuxedo Cake with chocolate chips... yes, this couple loves their chocolate :) Since then, Rissa has ordered the Tuxedo cake a few times... sometimes, pregnancy cravings really need to be fed with cake! haha. Congrats on the baby, you two :)

Tangled Inspired Birthday Cake

I did Oakley's Minnie Mouse themed birthday last year and this year, her mom wanted a Tangled themed birthday cake. Jill knew she didn't want a typical Tangled Tower cake so I came up with the idea of doing a dress-inspired cake. Since I love the movie, I knew what Repunzel's dress looked like and I wanted to incorporate the main symbolic star as well. Now, this being a Repunzel cake, I had to have some hair right? Well Oakley's smash cake was the top tier so it was all buttercream and then I added the yellow braid of marshmallow fondant hair. The cake was Rainbow Bright & Strawberry Cheesecake Cake (check out my full flavor list at www.SaltCakeCity.com). After i was done, I was a little worried that she looked.... like... I don't know, a headless doll! Oakley loved it so that's all that matters, right?

Painter's Topsy Turvy Birthday Cake

Effey wanted a unique birthday cake for YiaYia's 80th birthday cake! She wanted to incorporate her painting and the color scheme from their birthday invitations. To make it even more interesting, we did a topsy turvy cake. The whole cake is covered in marshmallow fondant and it was Caramel Crunch Cake (check out my full flavor list at www.SaltCakeCity.com). The paint on the top of the cake was all buttercream and the painting was done using food coloring as water color. The paintbrushes are marshmallow fondant as well. Yum!

Dress Form Birthday Cake

My favorite vintage wedding dress maker, Betsy from Modest Couture by Elizabeth (http://modestcouturebyelizabeth.com/) was having a birthday and her daughter wanted to me to make her a special cake. I have to say that this family is one of my most favorite clients to make cakes for because they always come to me first with great ideas, second with such faith, and third with so much enthusiasm! (The Ice Age cake I just posted and the Gold and white Princess Jasmine wedding cake were for this family... many more to come!)

The idea we had for this cake was to make it a dress-maker friendly cake. My thought was to do a dress form on top of a cute-sy little cake. Who knew it's ridiculously hard to sculpt a dress form out of rice krispies and then somehow get it to stay up there on a pole? Yeah... learned that the hard way. Haha. Anyway I added a few little marshmallow fondant rosettes and then said a prayer that the dress form would stand... luckily it did :) Thank you, ladies, for always challenging me and trusting me!

Spring Garden Themed Flower Cake

 

I know it's winter but let's dream of warmer days :) This is a spring themed garden cake I made for Leah's birthday. Colleen had a set of spring themed decor for the party and I matched the cake to those design ideas. Everything on the cake is edible, made of marshmallow fondant including the bees, ladybugs, and sign on top. So much fun to make! The cake was chocolate on top and the bottom was Turtle Power Cake (Check out my flavor list at SaltCakeCity.com).

I made the clouds by piping really thick circles of buttercream on the cake. Once it set for a bit, I pushed in the tiny little point that comes when you pipe frosting. I made the flowers by layering different flower shapes on top of each other. Enjoy!

Black & White Damask Wedding Cake

So last year, I made quite a few black and white damask wedding cakes. This one was definitely different and it was REALLY heavy! The cake was covered in marshmallow fondant and then I used a designer stencil and buttercream to essentially "paint" the design onto the side of the cake. I know that sounds easy but if it doesn't come out perfect, I have to take down all the fondant and then re-fondant the whole tier (is re-fondant a word??). The tiers were separated by styrofoam blocks and then the florist provided the flowers. I always tell people who want to have a tier of flowers in between that however many they think they need for the design, double it! This cake was a perfect example! The florist gave me a full bucket of flowers and if you could see the back of the cake, you would see where we ran out! Yikes! Luckily I used some extra filler flowers that the florist had left over to fill in the gaps in the back. Even more lucky, the cake was against a wall :) haha.

Pink Cowgirl Birthday Cake

Adison's cowgirl birthday party needed a sweet cowgirl cake to match her theme. We went with brown cow print for the bottom and then I made the paisley design on the top tier using leaf cutters and piping. There were marshmallow fondant sunflower/daisies and a MMF star. So fun! It was Strawberry Cheesecake Cake on the inside so even that matched the theme :)

Modern Pink Ruffle Flower Wedding Cake

 Vy wanted a unique wedding cake and had a very modern cake idea in mind. It was modeled after a cake she saw and loved. When I got to the wedding venue, she had a beautiful cake table set up complete with this adorable sign and a list of the cake flavors! Genius! The cake had Chocolate Hazelnut, White Raspberry Kiss and Double Chocolate Raspberry. The trick to the middle tier is to have 2 full tiers of cake inside one. I made 2 separate 8 inch round tiers and then put one on top of the other. I covered the whole thing in marshmallow fondant and then added this pink ruffled flower. Enjoy!

Yellow Flowers & Branch Cake

This wedding cake went with the Tardis groom's cake below. This was an all buttercream cake with a marshmallow fondant branch and sugar flowers going up the front (well, that's obvious, isn't it?). Let's see, what to tell.... This type of cake is just a matter of free-forming branches and placing them so that they don't look too bulky or too cluttered. Then, I added a few little sugar flowers with an edible pearl in the center of each. 

Katherine ordered Ruby Red Velvet, Vanilla Latte, and Lemon Supreme for this cake. Oh, for messy buttercream, it's actually hard to walk away from the design. I'm kind of a perfectionist so I always try to make it look "right" but messy buttercream is supposed to look wrong. It's about moving your wrist back and forth while rotating your cake and then taking a step back. Hard to explain, hard to walk away from :)

Mary Kay Cupcakes

 One of my favorite clients is a Mary Kay rep and she always comes to me with the best cake ideas! This time, she needed cupcakes for a Mary Kay event she was throwing and so we did make up themed cupcake toppers. I think they were Chocolate Peanut Butter cupcakes and Strawberry Shortcake Cupcakes. :) For the toppers, I hand cut them and just try to make them cute. How'd I do?

Hawaiian Themed Anniversary Cake

 This cake actually went with Pika's birthday cake that I describe below... it was his parents' 9th anniversary cake! Sarah wanted something Hawaiian to match the decor of the party but also because she loves Cake Lava and so do I!!! I modeled this cake after one of Cake Lava's beautiful creations. It was Emerald City Cake covered in marshmallow fondant, Yum! :)

Rainbow Birthday Cake

I make a cake for little Sheridan every year and this time, it was a fun rainbow themed birthday cake. There was a song that went along with it and so I used the details from the song to decorate the cake. Everything was made of fondant but my favorite little details were the little cupcakes! I wanted to eat them! Lisa, Sheridan's mom, had a little cupcake station at the party so that all of the little kids could make their own cupcakes and add the sprinkles they wanted. She dyed the inside of the cupcakes to be rainbow as well. How cute is that idea??

Lime Green & Pink Topsy Wedding Cake

This bride wanted some REALLY bright and fun for her wedding cake. This 3-tiered topsy turvy cake was covered in marshmallow fondant and then I added the swirls at the bottom by rolling long thin ropes of MMF and cutting them in half (so that there was a flat side to stick well to the cake). I free-handed the design which created way more variety in the design. I added white pearl swags and multi-colored ball border. For the sugar flowers, I used daisy cutters and sunflower cutters and dried them in small bowls to give them some shape. I love that we used the extra flowers on the table!

The flavors were Banana Cream Pie, Emerald City Cake, and Coconut Cream Pie Cake. For more info on the flavors, check out my website and the full list of flavors (www.SaltCakeCity.com).

Pink & Orange Cluster Wedding Cake

I'm sorry it's been so long since I've posted any cakes! I know, I'm a slacker! Now that the wedding season has calmed down, I wanted to start posting more cakes. This 4-tiered wedding cake was covered in marshmallow fondant. Turns out, horizontal stripes are 500 times harder to do that vertical ones. In this case, I did horizontal stripes painted with edible shimmer so that they popped off of the cake more. I then added a cluster of pink and orange sugar flowers with edible pearls in the center. 

These simple flowers were made by using a 5-petal cutter and then letting the flowers dry in an empty egg tray. I always make way more flowers than I think I will so that I don't run out but also so that I can use them later if I need some quick flowers :) I hope you like it!

Black & White Damask with Lime Green Flowers

Anika was having a very elegant wedding and wanted a damask patterned wedding cake. We originally played around with the idea of having lime green design on a white cake but then determined that black and white was the way to go with accents of lime green and white flowers. The cake was 24-Carrot Cake, Coconut Macaroon, and White Almond Wedding Cake (flavor list at www.SaltCakeCity.com). It was covered in homemade marshmallow fondant and then the design on the cake was all buttercream.

This cake was huge! It doesn't look like it from the picture but wow! When we carried this in, we were SO nervous about dropping it. The reception was held in the backyard of this beautiful estate and in order to get the cake into the wedding gazebo, we went through the driveway, down the side of the main house, down a steep heel, over a bridge (not over a river and through the hills though), and into the gazebo. Phew! This cake was HEAVY! In any case, the wedding reception was absolutely beautiful and just as I put the finishing touches on the cake, the beautiful bride and groom came in. They were so happy with the outcome and therefore, so was I  :)