Hello all! I am making a friend's b-day cake and need help on how to attach a gumpaste flower to the side of a three tiered cake. I am fairly new to cake decorating and newer still to making gumpaste flowers. The only practice I've had with attaching them to cakes was when I used a dab of buttercream to hold a gumpaste flower on some mini cakes. Any tips on how to keep them on? Wire might work, but I don't want to get lead in the cake... any advice??

   The design will be like the one pictured below (disclaimer: I found this pic on Pinterest).

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ACocktail stick and royal icing.

AIf I'm in a hurry I use softened white chocolate instead of royal as it hardens faster.

Royal icing is my **cement** of choice!! ;)

I'd put a bamboo kebab skewer into the back of the flower and then a dab of royal icing, then push it right into the cake.

The skewers are food safe, so no issue pushing that into the cake.

Good luck x

Suzanne x

Thanks for the tips! I think I will use a skewer and white chocolate.  

Beautiful cake! I love this "falling petals" wedding cake design. I've done it a few times and I start with the outside petals (attaching them with royal icing - my cakes were fondant) working in to the centre.  If the inside part of the flower is quite heavy like this one, I'd attach it to a cocktail stick and insert it into the cake using a dab of royal icing also. But I see the point in using chocolate as well, as other posters have mentioned.  I guess I started out with using royal icing as my glue of choice and old sdie hard!

Going off the point slightly, how are you going to colour the tips of the petals? I think this two-tone effect looks beautiful but it's a pain to do, at least the way I do it - going around the edges of the petals with a paintbrush and dust colour and trying to keep it fairly fine.  I've tried using an edible ink pen, but this is just as awkward.  Lazy me is just looking for a faster, magical way of doing this!

I also use modelling paste for the petals so they are not to fragile when it comes to  colouring the edges.

(For more colour combos, see: http://cakegeek.co.uk/index.php/falling-petals-wedding-cake/)

CakeGeekUk, I have tried using shimmer dust for my gumpaste flowers, but it doesn't seem to work - it won't spread out in a colorful dusty way and is kinda chunky - maybe it's the brand I've used. The last time I put gumpaste flowers on a cake, I painted food coloring on the edges with a paintbrush and that worked well.

   The cakes in the link you included were gorgeous!!  

Mix your shimmer dust with vodka or lemon extract to turn it into a paint...not too thin or it will run. Too thick and it will clump