My gumpaste flowers on cakes

I have been working with my friend Christy Platt who owns Simply Layered Cake Design www.simplylayered.com. She makes and decorates fantastic cakes and I make the gumpaste flowers. We have teamed up and how lucky for both of us since she loves to bake and decorate and I love to make the gumpaste flowers. What a team we make!! 

 Here are a couple of her cakes I with my gumpaste flowers 

One large gumpaste white peony

Gumpaste cymbidium orchids

Modern style Peony

Another flower order request was for a modern take on the Peony.. They wanted it big, bold, and white.. I have to admit I can get stuck in making sugar flowers only realistic. I do have fun going outside my box and creating something new, not knowing if the end result will be what they explained or what I like to do.. So far each time I have made a flower the customer has been happy.

Sometimes it is harder to make a flower without frills or without any details. Why? Because after I cut out the petal I want to make it into something different instead of just slightly giving it some softness. Then when I see it sitting in the drying area sort of plain I wonder if I should just add a bit of movement? Then I say to myself, this is what the client ordered. I can always make another my way.

I was very pleased how it turned out and how it looks on their cake. Being the petals were so big assembling them was sort of a challenge. It can get quite bulky and heavy fast.

Modern gumpaste Peony

Nothing but white flowers, please

I spent all last week making lots and lots and lots of flowers to fill an order. They wanted all white. I didn't have time to take any pictures of the process but will be making more of the same so I will next time.

It is hard for me to leave all these flowers in just white. When I looked at them scattered around the drying area I kept saying to myself.. just a little color. That is all they need. But, I left them alone. Or did I? I did add some color to the moth orchids since the throat just couldn't stay all white. And the Peonies have yellow stamens so there is the color.

White gumpaste flowers

When I laid all the white flowers out together to take the pictures I decided all white flowers do look really nice. I just looked at them for a while and realized they look very beautiful all white and they will be going on the cake and make the person very happy. They will be adding silver touches here and there to them so I will have to wait and see the pictures.

All the white gumpaste flowers together

Pink Peony

Pink Peony

This is a sample cake made for Colette's Catering showroom. This is one version or variety of the peony and pink seems to be the most requested color. I love to make these big bold flowers and are stunning on cakes if you want to make a statement.



Pink Peony close up

 This is why I chose this to demo at the Orange County Fair last year. It can be made with limited decorating tools and larger flowers are easier to learn than the small detailed ones I really enjoy to make..