Hi everyone,

 

I have to make a 7 tier wedding cake but the bride wants the top and the 5th tier to be real cake. I've done tier cakes before but never fake. I'm ordering fake rounds from 10" to 22"

Does anyone have experience with something like this? What will be the best support?

 

Also, the cake will have a cascade of petals from the top tier to the bottom one (on one side) so, will it be better to put it all together before delivery or attach a lot of petals at the reception site? Please help!!

 

Any advise will be greatly appreciated. Thank You!

you only need support in the 5th tier--just use any old dowels~

 

on the petals--i would place the bulk of them before delivery~

 

about delivery--make it easy for yourself--~

 

ok wait--what size are your tiers???~

 

i'm not getting the sizes right here.

 

~the top & 5th are real cake so those are an 8 and a 16?

 

~so it'd be 20x18x16x14x12x10x8

 

~or 22x20x18x16x14x12x10

 

~but you're ordering foam from 22 to 10-- if you're ordering a 10 out of foam--i'm confused ;)

 

~maybe you're skipping some sizes--doing it a little different?

Thank you for your fast response! 

The tiers are: 8"(real cake), 10",12",14",16"(real cake), 20" and 22". I made a mini version of it but I think it will be very different once all the tiers are together.

 

 

 

Dummy cakes (fake cakes) don't need any support...you''ll just need some dowels in the real cake, like K8memphis said.

 

As for the flowers and petal...i would put it on the cake before delivery and make some extra if some of them break of fall of. Make sure to bring some edible glue of royal icing to make repairs....if there's some to be made!

 

Oh and, to put your fondant on the dummy (fake cakes), I use a damp clean clothes, and you rub it on the tier so it the fondant will stick to it. you could also use piping gel or even icing.

 

p.s: your cake is beatiful!!!

you can use royal or just a blob of buttercream anything like that to create some tension~

 

so you are skipping the 18" -- interesting~

 

that's gonna make that design more of a challenge~

 

maybe the petals will change angles there and fan out rather than being placed up & down? 

wow -- good that you already have that worked out

 

22 is so very very big --what are they thinking?

 

i used to live in schererville ;)

AMake sure you charge appropriately, working with large dummy tiers can be a pain. People typically charge 80-100% the cost of real cake for fake tiers, in this case you're probably looking at a price in the $1500-2000 range.

I also use shortening rubbed on the dummy cakes for the fondant to adhere....works great! Beautiful cake! Can I ask how do you charge for some tiers to be fake? Do you have the client return to you after the event?  I am considering offering but don't have a clue how to go about it. Any suggestions would be appreciated.  Thank you!

A

It's usually too much trouble to reuse the dummy tiers, so we don't ask for them back. If (as an example) you charge 80% for dummy tiers and have a cake priced at $5/serving, you would get ~$150 for a 10" dummy tier, so you can see that the cost of the dummy is virtually negligible.

yes...that makes good sense Jason_Kraft.  Thank you!  If you didn't live in a big cosmopolitan city...but mid sized what would you charge for a style of cake like the Frills one by Maggie Austin? Really struggling with this one...b/c it is a time consuming project. Thank you for any advice you can give.  :)

A

It depends on how much labor is involved, we've never done that type of cake before so I have no idea how long it would take. Ballpark would probably be in the $7-8/serving range.

Thank you for the quick reply and you input.  It is so appreciated.  :)

A

K8memphis, I convinced them to add the 18" and end with a 20", I really think it will look a lot better. Thank you ;)

A

lesucrefour, what kind of center pole would you suggest? Do you thing PVC and a flange will work? Thanks in advance!

me too--awesome! way to go

A

Hi kjgm, for this cake I'm doing 8", 10", 12", 14",16", 18", and 20" from which only 8" and 16" will be real cake WASC with vanilla buttercream. I'm charging them around $700 and it will not be returned to me. Like we said before, I know am not charging them enough so I have to consider that for next time. It was hard to get a reference or calculate the price. I found some prices for Chicago (about 50 minutes from me) but I'm in Indiana and everything is cheaper here. I hope this helps :)

It does...thank you so much! And good luck!  :)

AI'm curious as to why you would do the 8" and the 16" in real cake, and not the 8,10,12? It is close to the same amount of servings, and would be easier to serve, since they won't have to pull the 10 and 12, and 14's off and find a place to put them, with the bottoms all sloppy, and big and awkward. Also, an 8" is a lot of space on top...a 6" is less awkward looking. According to my chart, a 16 and 8 is 124 servings. An 8,10,12 would be 118. Add the 6, and it is 130 servings. So, it is more prep and more baking, but the same amount of cake, 6 more or 6 servings less.

anna--it's true that the 8" has more surface but to me a smaller cake can sometimes look pin headed on the top of such a large bottomed cake--it can --it doesn't have to

 

i think that the decorating can absorb any kind of perspective issues either way

 

i prefer an 8 on top of a cake as large as this one is -- just my perception