Okay, I have a few cakes coming up that I'd love some help/advice on.

First, the yellow cake. The little risers between tiers...how is that done? I have only done directly stacked cakes, so I'm not sure.

And then the beaded cake - piped beads then painted with lustre dust? Or edible beads/dragees?

Okay - I think those are all of my questions (for now)!

For the yellow cake, I would do the risers in styrofoam, just cover them whatever icing you're using for the cakes.

Sorry - that was a lousy picture - reproduced too many times!

I updated with the best version that I have from my bride.

And hmmmm, now that I'm looking at the better version, do you think that the ivory beads are piped and the gold are dragees?

Those look like gold dragees to me. The white ones are probably fondant rolled into balls and coated with pearl dust (easiest done by cutting with a small round metal tip, rolled into balls and shaken in ziploc bag with some pearl dust).

Sorry double posted

you can also get pearl "dragees".... basically hard like a dragee but with a pearl finish. i buy them from a local cake supply store, but i am sure you could purchase online easily. hard pearls...

it would look more uniform to use the hard pearls and dragees.

yellow cake, styrofoam covered in icing/fondant- dont forget to add a center dowel.