iced

Romantic Garden Wedding Cake 23 July 2011

2011-11-01T12:59:00.011Z

On the 23rd of July Louise Zagozda was married at Glyn ar Afon Hotel in Usk. She asked me to design her a wedding cake which was romantic and traditional but with a fresh edge. She wanted to keep to a white colour palate but with a splash of pink to tie in with her wedding colours. The cake was covered in white sugarpaste and decorated with a descending pattern of trailing piped royal icing flowers and leaves:

The cake was four tiers, each with a different flavour. Louise chose a base tier of hot toddy fruit cake, and the remaining tiers of sumptuous belgian chocolate cake filled with white chocolate buttercream, carrot cake filled with cinnamon cream cheese frosting and lemon cake filled with lemon curd and vanilla buttercream.

Just lovely! Many many congratuations to you both!

'Masquerade' cake - 08 July 2011

2011-11-01T12:03:00.011Z

I had the great pleasure of making Sian Owen's wedding cake on the 8th of July. Sian wanted a real statement cake which would be a centrepiece for her wedding day. We looked at lots of different possible designs but one particularly caught Sian's eye - I sketched a design which was based around the design of her wedding dress, Masquerade by Ian Stuart:

The one thing that Sian wanted the cake to be was big which meant it could take a lot of detail and intricate design which was great fun for me! The top three tiers of the cake were covered in swathed ivory sugarpaste hand brushed with pealescent shimmer to mimic the fabric of the dress. The back of these tiers was finished with a sugar paste 'seam' finished with 'pearl buttons':

I covered the bottom two tiers with over 300 hand rolled sugar flowers which were then dusted with pearlescent shimmer.

Sian chose a base tier of hot toddy fruit cake and remaining tiers of Jaffa (sumptuous belgian chocolate cake with orange buttercream filling), Lemon cake filled with homemade lemon curd and vanilla buttercream and madagascan vanilla cake filled with homemade raspberry compote and white chocolate buttercream.

I enjoyed every minute of making this cake, thanks so much to Sian for allowing me free reign! Wishing you every possible happinness for the future!

Kitt and Marco's Silhouette Wedding Cake - 18th June 2011

2011-11-01T11:32:00.007Z

Kitt and Marco are a lovely couple. She is from Texas and he is from Wales. They were very clear from the outset about what they wanted their cake to be. They wanted it to be fun, frivolous and reflective of their different origins and importantly incorporating a graphic design element which was a strong theme of their wedding. They didn't want anything that looked like a traditional wedding cake, there needed to be a reference to birds as this was another theme running through the day and the colour green needed to be included too.

As always I sketched a few different designs and this is the one they chose!:

I kept the colours to black and white for a striking graphic feel. The top tier is a silhouette of Welsh landmarks and the bottom tier a silhouette of Texan landmarks using overlaid sugarpastes. The middle tier with the black birds on a wire reverses the layers of colour with the two birds in tandem flight (representing Kitt and Marco) in the lime green to give a pop of colour.

Kitt and Marco chose tiers of triple layered Strawberry Sundae cake (strawberry cake layered with vanilla buttercream) and of course Red Velvet with white chocolate cream cheese frosting for extra decadence!

The cake was placed at the centre of a dessert buffet which was comprised of cakes and sweet treats made by guests at the wedding. Lovely! Kitt and Marco have now embarked upon a new adventure living in Texas! Good luck and much happiness to you both!

Cookies for Cerys - 7th May 2011

2011-11-01T11:15:00.007Z

Cerys' mum Elin asked me to make some pretty pink butterfly cookies for Cerys' naming celebration on the 7th of May. The cookies were tied up in polythene bags and finished off with pink ribbon and given to all of the guests as they left the party!

Thanks so much to Elin for her order!

Busy Bee

2011-11-01T10:55:00.002Z

Gosh it's been a busy summer. So busy I have been entirely neglectful of this blog! It has been busy in a lovely way though working with lovely people on their wedding and celebration cakes, and outside of work planning my own wedding and starting to set up home in a new place (more on this later). Now these lovely autumn days are upon us it's about time I caught up on my summer blog posts! Apologies for their belated nature!

Kate's Baby Shower Cookies

2011-05-05T23:56:00.006+01:00

I had the great pleasure of making Kate and Dominic's wedding cake last April. I was so excited when Kate's maid of honour, Elaine, got in touch back in March to order some cookies for a surprise baby shower for Kate. Elaine asked for the cookies to be piped in the same bright colours as the baby's nursery, the result is really fresh and pretty:

Big big congratulations to Kate and Dominic on the birth of your lovely baby girl and many thanks to Elaine for thinking of iced to help mark this special occasion!

Claire and Roland's Wedding Cake

2011-04-20T10:34:00.017+01:00

Claire and Roland were married on Monday on the most beautiful sunny spring day at Llangoed Hall, Llyswen. Claire had seen a style of cake that she loved in a magazine with the cake tiers separated by blocks of ribbon but wanted it to reflect a romantic country garden style. After sketching out a few ideas we softened the design by incorporating layered champagne and dusky pink ribbon, piped royal icing dots to the sides of the cake and used romantic free-form sugar roses in dusky pink and ivory to connect the tiers.

Claire and Roland chose a top tier of hot toddy fruit cake and two tiers of triple layered Madagascan vanilla sponge filled alternatively with white chocolate buttercream and home-made raspberry compote. Many thanks to Claire and Roland for being really fun to work with, wishing them every happiness for the future.

Avril's Beatles Cake

2011-04-20T10:16:00.011+01:00

My lovely mum was 60 on Saturday and of course I had to make her a cake. I asked her if she had any requests and being a big Beatles fan she asked for something with a Beatles theme. This was perfect as my sister and I had been thinking along the lines of having a 1960's themed dinner party to celebrate. The cake was three tiers of triple layered Belgian chocolate sponge filled with white chocolate buttercream.

My sister did a fabulous job of organising the dinner at Miskin Manor and put together a table of 1960's memorabilia for guests to peruse:

It was a really lovely evening made most special by all of the family and friends who joined us to celebrate!

Harri's Christening Cookies

2011-04-20T10:15:00.004+01:00

Harri was Christened at the weekend on a beautiful sunny day. The service took place in Abercynon with a reception afterwards at the Community Hall in Quakers Yard.

My brief was to make vanilla cookie favours for the little guests keeping to the blue and white spot theme of the day:

Apologies

2011-03-22T15:42:00.003Z

I've just found out that my telephone answering service hasn't been recording messages as it should :o( the problem is now fixed but many apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Lilac and Pink Birthday Cupcakes

2011-03-16T14:23:00.024Z

I am feeling very spring-like this week, the sun is shining, lambs are bouncing around the fields and fresh colours are appearing all around! I made this cupcake tower for Philippa's mother's 60th Birthday celebration on Sunday. My brief was that the cake should comprise 150 British style cupcakes with Madagascan vanilla sponge, topped with fondant icing in lilac colours with half of the cupcakes decorated with sugar flowers and the other half plainly iced with a little sparkle! The top tier cutting cake was a ginger cake filled with lemon buttercream. I iced the top tier using lilac sugarpaste which was then hand piped with royal icing dots in the same colour, I topped the cake with a mixture of loose and tight pink sugar roses which I interspersed with sugar pearls.

The celebration took place in Surrey and the cake was collected by a family member so I don't have any photographs of it set up in-situ but I constructed the cake using half of the cupcakes in my studio to photograph it to give you an idea of how it looked!

The smooth, swirled fondant gives a really pleasing effect I think:

Many thanks to Philippa and her father for ordering the cake from iced (despite being based so many miles away!) and to Mike for recommending iced to them. It was an absolute pleasure to make! Wishing Philippa's mum a very happy 60th birthday!

The Handmade Wedding Collective Exhibition

2011-03-07T15:12:00.007Z

The Handmade Wedding Collective Exhibition, which is taking place between the 15th and the 20th of March at Craft Central, London, is showcasing 14 fabulous UK designer-makers. If you are looking for gifts for your guests, fabulous jewellry, gorgeous garters or beautiful silk ties for your groom / groomsmen like these from the wonderful Peggy Bamford:

do pop along and visit the exhibition. All of the location, timing and exhibitor details can be found here. Happy shopping!

Your South Wales Wedding Panel

2011-03-03T15:53:00.004Z

In this months Your South Wales Wedding magazine I was asked about wedding cakes on a budget. A lovely cake is a really central part of any wedding I think (but then I am biased!) the only problem is that they can be expensive particularly if they incorporate a lot of detailed decorative work or if they are structurally complex. If you are working to a budget don't despair, there are many ways to reduce the cost of your cake:

Serve your cake as a dessert if your wedding venue allows, ask your caterer to provide little jugs of coulis or cream to go with the cake.
Cupcakes are often a cheaper alternative to a stacked cake. They look beautiful and impressive when set up on a cake stand and each guest receives their own beautifully decorated cake.
Choose a beautiful diminutive two tier cake and then ask your cake maker to provide extra undecorated cutting cakes which will be kept behind the scenes and cut up for serving
And of course if you have an excellent baker in the family why not get them involved in helping to make your cake whether it would be making the whole thing start to finish or indeed simply baking the cakes which a professional cake maker could then decorate.

Nicola and Gareth's Spring Cupcake Wedding Cake

2011-02-19T01:28:00.012Z

Nicola and Gareth were married at the beautiful St David's Hotel and Spa in Cardiff Bay on the 12th of February. It was a beautiful day with the first of the spring sunshine peaking through. Perfect! Nicola and Gareth chose a cupcake wedding cake with six different flavours of American style cupcakes. They selected Vanilla Vanilla, Blueberry Whirl, Strawberry Sundae, Sumptuous Chocolate, Mango Madness and Mint Chocolate Chip with a top tier of Chocolate Cherry Fruit Cake. Each flavour cake was decorated slightly differently and I made a cupcake menu so the guests could select their flavour of choice.

Nicola and Gareth wanted the cake to be decorated with predominantly white sugar flowers but with hints of blue and yellow. I made sugar roses, orchids and iris's to corresponded with the flowers Nicola had selected for the bouquets and table centrepieces for the cupcakes. You can see the beautiful flowers which Claire from The Bee Orchid Florist provided for the wedding here. The top tier was decorated with open white sugar roses and small yellow rose buds with edible diamonds interspersed. I also piped the top tier with royal icing and used white sugar pearls to accentuate the design.

Nicola's grandparents, who live in Scotland, were unable to attend the wedding so Nicola asked me to box an individual cupcake for them each and the boxes were tied with the same beautiful blue ribbon that was used on the top tier and throughout the reception room.

Many congratulations to Nicola and Gareth. It was really lovely working with you to create your wedding cake. Wishing you all of our best wishes for the future!

Kate and Dominic - Wedding of The Year

2011-01-07T13:39:00.003Z

Back in June the lovely Kate and Dominic entered Your South Wales Wedding's Wedding of The Year competition, which I posted about here. Kate emailed me just before Christmas to let me know that they have now reached the final! Please find a few moments to click here and vote for them! Many thanks!

Iced in the Press - Your South Wales Wedding Nov/Dec

2011-01-06T15:32:00.005Z

The hot topic for November/December's Your South Wales Wedding Magazine's panel was Family Dilemmas. Planning weddings to please everyone involved can be a little tricky (and, let's face it, sometimes impossible!). Thankfully, as far as cakes are concerned, a good cake maker will always have a few tricks up his/her sleeve! My hot topic was catering for guests with food intolerances:

My scanned copy isn't very clear, but you can see the full 'Ask the Experts' section here and I've typed up my Q&A below;

Q. My fiance and I would love to have a large, traditional, tiered wedding cake for our special day and would like to serve it as a dessert at the wedding breakfast. However, a few of our relatives have gluten allergies. Is it still possible to have our dream cake without having to leave anyone out?

A. Absolutely! This is a question I am often asked, in fact, around 50 per cent of my clients ask me to cater for special dietary requirements. The main concern when catering for guests with allergies or intolerances is cross-contamination, so the first thing you need to do is to find a cake designer that can bake a cake in a gluten-free environment.

Ask to try some of the company's gluten-free creations and remember to compare it to those that aren't. After all, there's no reason why these cakes should be any less scrumptious than any other variety!

If you have quite a number of guests that are gluten-intolerant, it might be worth making one of the smaller tiers of your cake gluten-free. However, if you only have a few guests that require a dessert which is gluten-free, why not serve them miniature gluten-free cakes in individual boxes? Your cake designer can even make them look like mini replicas of your traditional wedding cake, and that will make your guests feel very special indeed!

Becky and Andrew's Elegant Ivory and Black Wedding Cake

2011-01-06T14:35:00.003Z

The lovely Becky and Andrew held their reception at Canada Lake and Lodge just outside Creigiau after their church wedding on the 5th of December. I delivered their cake on a fabulously frosty Saturday morning, the lake was beautifully peaceful and inside the lodge fires were blazing. It was simply stunning.

From the outset Becky and Andrew knew that they wanted their cake to fit with the sophisticated winter ivory and black theme of their wedding. They chose two flavours of cake - chocolate cherry fruit cake for the base tier and Madagascan vanilla Madeira cake filled with raspberry compote and buttercream for the remaining two tiers. Delicious!

We looked at varying different designs for the cake and settled on an elegant criss-cross quilted design which was accented with tiny piped royal icing beadwork in the groves. We used an opulent thick velvet ribbon to circle each tier and a slightly wider width of the same ribbon for the centre bow.

Becky and Andrew were absolutely brilliant to work with - designing and making their cake was a total pleasure. Sending them both my best wishes and wishing them every future happiness together!

(Andrew owns one of my favourite shops in Cowbridge Number 81 Interiors do check out their website and shop!)

Happy New Year!

2011-01-06T14:29:00.000Z

Wishing you all a very happy 2011! Happy planning for all of those organising celebrations and weddings for next year!

Apologies ...

2011-01-06T14:26:00.003Z

Many apologies for my shameful lack of blog posting! With one thing and another I have managed to get shamefully behind. There's lots to catch up on, lots of lovely cakes made and coverage of iced in the press all of which will be winging its way too you shortly!

Cowbridge Fashion Week!

2010-10-19T11:49:00.003+01:00

This week is a busy week in Cowbridge. Not only is Cowbridge Music Festival in full swing (I'm looking forward to the Calvert-Turner Duo this evening), it's also Cowbridge Fashion week. Enjoy champagne afternoon teas, lunches and dinners all combined with fashion shows; a fashion parade down the high street on Thursday with late night opening and a champagne trail in all of Cowbridge's boutiques followed by a day of fashion shows in Cowbridge Town Hall on Saturday.

Kicking off the fashion shows on Saturday morning is High Society Bridal. Gowns from Jenny Packham, Alan Hannah, Suzanne Neville, Stephanie Allin, Sassi Holford and Mia Mia will be showcased as well as Mother of the Bride and Grooms attire. We work closely with High Society and we'll be helping to fill their goody bags with sweet treats. Tickets are £5.00 and can be purchased from High Society.

Gillian and Jay's Little Tiffany Box cakes

2010-10-10T16:38:00.005+01:00

The lovely Gillian and Jay were married in London a few weeks ago. On Saturday they held a celebratory dinner at the wonderful Llangoed Hall in the Brecon Beacons. Gillian's engagement ring was purchased from Tiffany's and she wanted her celebratory cake to be comprised of elegant little Tiffany boxes, one for each of her guests.

Gillian and Jay chose a classic Madagascan vanilla sponge filled with raspberry compote and vanilla buttercream for the cakes. These little sponge cubes nestled inside sugar boxes built out of hand coloured (to get that exact beautiful blue/green Tiffany's hue) stiffened sugarpaste. The white sugar ribbons and bows were brushed with pearl shimmer to mimic the satin sheen of Tiffany ribbon.

Many many thanks to Gillian and Jay, the new Mr and Mrs Krause! wishing you both every future happiness!

Louise and Jeremy's autumn cupcakes

2010-10-09T18:59:00.005+01:00

The lovely Louise and Jeremy were married at the weekend at their local church followed by a reception at the New Cottage Dance Centre in Ystrad Mynach. Louise and Jeremy knew from the outset that they wanted to have a cupcake wedding cake incorporating the lovely autumn colours which abound at this time of year. Louise's bouquet had red roses, orange cala lilies and hypericum berries so we wanted to stick to those rich reds and oranges. They chose four different flavoured cupcakes: the flavour Louise named the Lindt cupcake(!) chocolate cupcakes filled with praline and topped with white chocolate buttercream, vanilla cupcakes topped with strawberry buttercream, blueberry cupcakes topped with blueberry and vanilla buttercream, and caramel cupcakes topped with toffee buttercream. The cupcakes were decorated with hand-moulded sugar decorations: red roses, clusters of rose buds, autumn leaves and orange cala lilies.

Louise and Jeremy chose a chocolate cherry fruitcake for their top tier cake. They liked the flavour so much they decided to have a tier of mini chocolate cherry fruit cakes too!

Thanks so much Louise and Jeremy for being brilliant to work with. It was lovely to speak to you on your wedding day. I'm so glad you enjoyed your cake! Wishing you both all the very best!

Verity and Simon's official photographs

2010-10-09T18:39:00.007+01:00

The lovely Verity and Simon have very kindly sent me through copies of their beautiful official wedding photographs taken by the talented team at Dutkowski

I love these photographs of Simon's mother and Aunt with their special gluten/dairy free fruitcakes!

So lovely! Thanks so much again Verity and Simon for sending these images through and allowing me to post them! What a difference from my badly-lit images below!!

Something blue - cookies!

2010-10-08T16:42:00.005+01:00

Vanilla cookies hand piped with royal icing placed at guests place settings make lovely favours (excellent for polishing off with tea and coffee after your wedding meal) and are a fun elegant way to incorporate your Something Blue into your wedding day!

Kate and Dominic in the Final!

2010-10-08T16:36:00.002+01:00

Congratulations to Kate and Dominic who have made it through to the Final of Your South Wales Wedding's Wedding of the Year competition!!! I made Kate and Dominic's cupcake wedding cake back in April. You can read about it here.

Keeping our fingers crossed for them for the Final!

iced in the Press: Your South Wales Wedding

2010-10-08T16:35:00.004+01:00

Four of iced's cakes are currently being featured in Your South Wales wedding magazine!!! On the first page the pink and gold cupcakes (top right) and champage bubble cake (bottom centre) are featured, and on the second page the deco cake and corsage cake (both centre)!

Many thanks to the team at Your South Wales Wedding for featuring us again. Keep an eye out also for the November / December issue where I will be on their hot topic panel answering your cake related questions!!

Verity and Simon's Elegant Ivory Cake

2010-09-07T18:14:00.020+01:00

On Saturday 4th of September Verity and Simon were married at Llandaff Cathedral followed by a reception at St Davids Hotel in Cardiff Bay. I had such a great time working with Verity to design her cake! Verity knew from the outset that she wanted something simple and elegant, incorporating the sage green / ivory colour palate which they had chosen to run throughout their day. Using intricate loose romantic hand moulded sugar roses to accent the separate tiers, the cake was structured along simple lines with tiny piped royal icing beadwork to add texture (apologies for the quality of the images, the cake was delivered the evening before the wedding and so the photographs were not taken using natural light).

Verity and Simon chose a base tier of hot toddy fruit cake with the two remaining tiers comprised of Madagascan vanilla sponge filled with vanilla buttercream and raspberry compote. There were a few guests with gluten and dairy intolerances for whom we made special individual fruit cakes:

Many thanks to Verity and Simon! I hope you are having a truly fantastic time on your fabulous honeymoon! Wishing you both every happiness and a wonderful future together!

Siobhan and Daz's Shimmering Shell Cupcake Cake

2010-08-27T15:34:00.007+01:00

The brilliant Siobhan and Daz had a beautiful romantic beach wedding in Sri Lanka in July with close friends and family. On their return at the weekend they hosted a wedding party to celebrate their marriage at the lovely Bryn Garw House near Bridgend. Siobhan and Daz wanted to keep the relaxed beach theme running through their wedding party and so they opted for a tower of American style cupcakes, decorated with a touch of blue sparkle and shimmering pearlescent sugar shell decorations which were hand moulded from sugarpaste.

They opted for four different flavoured cupcakes: Lemon meringue cupcakes (lemon sponge cake filled with zingy home-made lemon curd and topped with Italian meringue), Bounty cupcakes (Belgian chocolate sponge cake filled and topped with coconut frosting), Mango Passion cupcakes (mango sponge cake filled and topped with passion fruit buttercream) and Mint Chocolate Chip (Belgian chocolate chip sponge cake filled and topped with mint buttercream). We decorated the different flavours with different shell combinations and produced a cupcake menu so guests could pick their flavour of choice! The top tier cake was Pina Colada flavour(!) a scrumptious moist coconut cake layered with pineapple buttercream. Delicious!

Siobhan and Daz are friends as well as clients so it was really lovely to be a guest at their wedding celebration! Sending them all of my best wishes for a fabulously happy life together!

Helen and Nigel's Little Lilac Mini Cakes

2010-08-27T15:15:00.005+01:00

Many apologies, I've got a little behind with my blog posting!! The lovely Helen and Nigel were married two Saturdays ago at the Glyn Clydach Hotel near Neath. Helen wore a beautiful pale lilac gown for the ceremony and the wedding flowers were principally comprised of Calla lilies so we wanted to incorporate the colour and flowers into the design of the cake. Helen and Nigel chose two tier mini Sumptuous Chocolate (Belgian chocolate sponge cake filled with white and dark chocolate ganache) cakes for their guests and a top tier in the same flavour.

It was a real pleasure working with Helen and Nigel to design their cake. I hope they had a truly wonderful day! Wishing them every happiness together!

*N.B. Many apologies for the quality of these photographs: unfortunately my 'proper' camera suffered a malfunction that morning and so I had to use my standby camera, hence the slightly blurry images.

Pretty in Pink Cookies

2010-08-07T10:57:00.000+01:00

We were asked to make these pretty pink cookies as favours for Carrie and John's wedding at the weekend. The vanilla cookies were hand piped with dusky pink royal icing and then over-piped with white royal icing and finished with a double white and pink bow. Lovely!

Pink and Gold Cupcakes

2010-07-31T15:13:00.015+01:00

I've already posted about the cupcakes I made for my Nana's 90th birthday party but I'm very excited as I have just recieved these beautiful photographs from Portia Morgan who photographed the day for us brilliantly

Absolutely stunning photography! I'm really looking forward to working with the very talented Portia on a cake shoot for the iced website which is going to see a few changes in the near future!

Ifan Morgan and Karolina's Beautiful Berry Wedding Cake and Cookies

2010-07-31T14:54:00.015+01:00

Ifan and Karolina were married today with the reception at the lovely Miskin Manor Hotel! Their wedding was planned along the lines of a beautiful romantic country garden party and they definitely wanted their cake to reflect this. Karolina's bridesmaids wore beautiful pale spruce green dresses which Ifan and Karolina wanted to incorporate into the design of the cake. I mixed the colour of the sugarpaste to match the beautiful green colour and then once the cake was assembled brushed it with pearlescence to give the cake a lovely glimmering sheen. The tiers were then decorated with an abundance of hand moulded white sugar flowers, green leaves and berries in a very loose, relaxed formation. I love this Birdseye view of the cake from above with all the lovely berry colours coming through:

The cake was comprised of three tiers of zesty lemon drizzle cake, filled with scrumptious zingy lemon curd and vanilla buttercream frosting, and one tier of zesty lemon drizzle cake filled with lovely lime curd and vanilla buttercream frosting.

Ifan and Karolina also asked me to make lemon cookie favours for their guests using the same pale spruce green colour. Each guest's name was piped on their cookie so that they could double up as place names! Perfect!

I've absolutely loved making Ifan and Karolina's cake and cookies! They have been absolutely lovely to work with! Wishing them a truly fabulous day full of fun and happiness and all of our best wishes for the future!

Clive's 60th Birthday!

2010-07-31T14:32:00.005+01:00

Well hot on the heels of my grandmother's 90th birthday, last weekend my father turned 60! Buying a gift for my father is very difficult so my sister, mother and I decided to host a surprise birthday party for him instead. I'm very lucky that my lovely man is not only talented artist himself but his great uncle, who lives in Jersey and is a well known artist on the island, very very kindly painted us a watercolour to give to my father as a birthday gift. Using only photographs John painted the most superb caricature - it was so beautiful we used it for the front of our invitations.

Isn't it brilliant! I had to pay homage in my own small way to the painting by making a representation of it in cake form!!

The party was such a great success, thank you to each and every one of our 94 guests who had travelled from far and wide (England, Scotland, Belgium, Sweden... and of course Wales) to be there to celebrate with us. A big thank you to Serge and his team from the Knife and Fork deli in Cowbridge, they did an absolutely stupendous job with the catering, I cannot recommend them highly enough! But finally thank you to John for his fantastic painting which will always remind my father of his brilliant birthday!

Leanne and Jamie's Clambering Rose Wedding Cake

2010-07-27T00:53:00.011+01:00

On Saturday Leanne and Jamie were married at Llansantffraed Court in Monmouthshire. Their marquee was decorated with pretty pink and blue bunting and beautiful candelabra centerpieces. Leanne was looking for a cake which was simple, elegant but with unusual detailing. Her beautiful dress, Cabaret by Ian Stewart had a fabulous asymetric rouched flower detailing on the shoulder and concealed in the skirts of the dress, so I designed a cake which incorporated the style of the dress using hand-moulded open sugar flowers and piped royal icing beadwork to create the effect. Leanne's bridesmaids wore dresses in dusky pink and so we carried this colour through with the ribbon bands which encircled each tier.

Leanne and Jamie chose to have three tiers of scrumptious fruit cake. The base tier was a hot toddy fruit cake, the middle tier a chocolate cherry fruitcake and the top tier a tutti fruiti fruit cake (with apricots and ginger). Delicious!

This cake was an absolute joy to work on, many thanks to Leanne and Jamie! I hope you both had a truly wonderful day! Sending you both all my best wishes for the future!

Hetty's Cupcake Birthday Cake

2010-07-21T10:18:00.013+01:00

I don't normally feature birthday cakes on this blog but this one is very special as I made it to celebrate my Nana's 90th birthday at the weekend! We held the lunch / afternoon tea party in the Garden Room / Lounge at the Miskin Manor Hotel - it was a truly special day, celebrating with friends and family.

We decided to keep the colour palate to vintage pink and gold and so the tables were decorated with pink rose petals, the napkins were tied with pink ribbons and each guest at their place setting had a mini pink and gold candle and white butterfly filigree favour box which was filled with white and pink coconut ice and tied with pink ribbon. Everything looked so beautiful and all of the family worked really hard to make everything look so lovely!

I was in charge of the cake and I decided on cupcakes both for their sheer prettiness (and also as they were to be served as part of the afternoon tea, for their fabulous ease of distributing). I made three different flavour cupcakes, vanilla filled with raspberry compote and frosted with vanilla buttercream, lemon filled with zingy lemon curd and frosted with vanilla buttercream and chocolate filled and frosted with coconut buttercream (bounty flavour!). Each flavour was decorated slightly differently with open roses, rose buds, flower posies and leaves, sticking to the lovely pink and gold colours of the tables! The cupcakes were then finished with pretty white butterfly cupcake wrappers to complement the favour boxes!

The top tier was a hot toddy fruit cake so that Nana could keep it to enjoy with friends at a later date! Wishing Nana many more lovely birthday celebrations and here's to hoping I look half as fabulous as she does when I'm 90!

Garden Party Cupcakes

2010-07-20T15:31:00.008+01:00

At the beginning of June I had the great pleasure of making Charlotte and Warren's wedding cake. At the weekend Charlotte's parents held a garden party for neighbours who couldn't be present at the wedding and they asked me to make cupcakes to be served to their guests. We decided to keep the same flavour cupcakes (vanilla cupcakes with raspberry filling and vanilla frosting and chocolate cupcakes with cherry filling and white chocolate frosting) and the same designs, just adding a splash of colour with the green leaves and green calyx's to keep with the garden party feel! Lovely! Many thanks again to Charlotte's Mum and Dad!

Gemma and Chris's Wedding Cupcakes

2010-07-08T22:15:00.011+01:00

Gemma and Chris were married last weekend on a beautiful sunny day at the Marriott St Pierre Hotel in Chepstow. Chris is the brother of a friend and I was delighted when they asked me to make their wedding cake! Their beautiful wedding was designed around a silver / grey / black colour palate and so they chose to have cupcakes in silver cases on a silver mirrored stand. The lovely couple were heading off on honeymoon on a driving adventure around Europe and so asked me for a giant cupcake top tier cake which they could box up and take with them on their travels! The giant cupcake was a banana cake filled with caramel and frosted with vanilla buttercream!

Gemma and Chris chose three different flavours of cupcake for their wedding: Belgian Chocolate cupcakes with a gooey praline filling topped with white chocolate buttercream, lemon cupcakes filled with lemon curd filling and topped with lemon buttercream and vanilla cupcakes filled with raspberry compote and topped with vanilla buttercream. Each flavour was decorated differently, the chocolate with a sparkly white sugarpaste bow, the vanilla with a large white gerbera with a sparkly centre and the lemon with three mini gerberas with sparkly centres, to tie in with the gerberas on the tables and the bows on the chairs.

Many thanks to Gemma and Chris! It was lovely to celebrate with you in the evening! Wishing you both all of my best wishes and every happiness for the future!

Kirsten and Gethin's Lovely Lilac Wedding Cake

2010-07-08T20:17:00.010+01:00

Last Saturday the lovely Kirsten and Gethin were married at the stylish Holm House Hotel in Penarth. Holm House is a beautiful design-focused boutique hotel which has an enviable position overlooking the sea. The wedding breakfast was held in the dining room at Holm House which is adorned with shimmering flock wallpaper from Osborne and Little in lilacs and darker plum purples. I designed the cake in a very pale lilac to complement the decor of the room and decorated it with piped white royal icing beadwork in an abstract feathered design. The cake was then topped with hand moulded loose romantic sugar roses!

Kirsten and Gethin chose moist chocolate fruit cake for the base tier of their cake with the remaining tiers Madagascan vanilla cake filled with raspberry compote and vanilla buttercream. Kirsten's father has a gluten intolerance so we made him special little gluten free versions of the main cake:

Many thanks to Kirsten and Gethin for being so lovely to work with. Wishing them all the best for a very happy future together!

Wedding of the Year Competition

2010-06-09T15:03:00.001+01:00

We are really excited to announce that Kate and Dominic's wedding has been selected for Your South Wales Wedding's Wedding of the Year Competition! We had the pleasure of making Kate and Dominic's romantic cupcakes and cookies back in April, you can read about the cake and cookies here.

Kate was kind enough to send me some of the photographs her official photographer took of the cake cutting!:

The wedding is going to be featured in the July /August issue of the magazine but voting starts online from the 18th of June. Please do pop along to the website and vote for this lovely couple's wedding!

Charlotte and Warren's Elegant Cupcakes and Summery Cookies

2010-06-07T18:18:00.012+01:00

Last Friday Charlotte and Warren were married at the beautiful Mellington Hall in Powys. Charlotte's lovely parent's collected the cupcakes and cookies on the Thursday to take to the hotel so I'm afraid I do not have photographs of the cakes set up in situ but I did take some of my own photographs before they were collected.

Charlotte and Warren planned their wedding with a romantic, summer garden feel in mind. They wanted a cupcake cake which exuded informal elegance and sophisticated romance. After their tasting Charlotte and Warren chose cupcakes in two different flavours: vanilla cupcakes filled with fresh seedless raspberry compote and frosted with vanilla buttercream frosting and Belgian chocolate cupcakes filled with fresh cherry compote and topped with white chocolate buttercream. The vanilla cupcakes were decorated with three tiny hand moulded sugar buds and the chocolate cupcakes loose, romantic hand moulded sugar roses and leaves. The top tier was a chocolate fruit cake decorated with loose, hand moulded sugar roses and leaves and piped with tiny white royal icing dots, tied with two different types of white organza ribbon and finished with a diamante and pearl button:

Charlotte also asked me to make summery daisy cookies, which were served to the guests on platters with a glass of bubbly after the ceremony. We made three different sized cookies in three flavours: vanilla, zesty lemon and zesty orange, the cookies were then hand piped with yellow, lemon and white royal icing and decorated with a little bit of sparkle:

Charlotte also asked me to make special vanilla cookies for the littlest guests Toby and Olly:

Thank you to Charlotte and her mother for being so lovely and making the design process such fun! Wishing Charlotte and Warren every happiness for their future lives together!

Kelly and Rick's Elegant Champagne Bubble Cake

2010-05-21T11:14:00.008+01:00

Kelly and Rick were married today at the Coed-y-Mwstwr hotel near Bridgend. Kelly comes from New Zealand and I think her family have brought the sunshine with them to Wales! Blazing sunshine lit up the lovely bluebell strewn drive this morning as I drove up to the hotel. Kelly and Rick decided upon a simple and elegant four tier wedding cake: two of the tiers were moist carrot cake filled with cinnamon cream cheese frosting and two of the tiers were Belgian chocolate brownie cake filled with white and milk chocolate ganache. Scrumptious!

We decided to keep the design of the cake to a very classic style with white royal icing piped beadwork mimicking champagne bubbles on white sugarpaste, accented with navy bows in a ribbon to match the colour of the bridesmaid's gowns. We topped the cake with an elegant sugar looped cluster bow.

It was an absolute pleasure working with Kelly and Rick to design their cake! Wishing them a truly wonderful day and many best wishes for the future!

Technical Hitch

2010-05-07T16:51:00.003+01:00

Just to let you know that I have been experiencing a few technical hitches with the online form on my webiste. I am assured that the glitch has now been ironed out but I may not have received some enquiries over the last weeks. Many apologies if you have been affected by this, please do get in touch again either by email or by telephone.

Image theft

2010-04-26T17:13:00.002+01:00

It has been recently brought to my attention that images have been stolen from this blog by a "cake maker" called Cake Temptation based in Kent who is passing my images off as his own. Action is currently being taken against this individual. I can't tell you how dissapointed I am that someone would do this, not just from my point of view and that of my clients, but also that people are being hoodwinked into ordering cakes from this man. The matter was brought to my attention by another cakemaker who discovered that this individual has stolen 15 of her images and to date has refused to remove them. Absolutely despicable.

UPDATE: I am pleased to say that Cake Temptation have now changed their website and removed my images from their website...

Lizzie and John's Blue Butterfly Cake

2010-04-20T11:56:00.010+01:00

Lizzie and John where married on Friday on the most beautiful sunny spring day at the King Arthur Hotel in Reynoldston on the Gower Peninuslar. They both liked the Butterfly design which they had seen on the iced website and so we tailored the design to fit with their pale blue colour scheme. We also made one or two other changes to the design: we added a slight pearlescence to the blue fondant icing, piped royal icing detailing on to the little butterflies, used a cluster of white roses interspersed with butterflies on the top of the cake and added a little bow at the centre of the top tier. Lovely!

Lizzie and John had a number of guests who are gluten intollerant and so we made the top tier of the cake a gluten free 'jaffa' cake (sumptuous belgian chocolate cake filled with orange buttercream), the remaining two tiers were lemon drizzle cake filled with vanilla buttercream and scrumptious homemade lemon curd.

Lizzie and John are such a lovely couple and they were fabulous to work with. We send them all of our best wishes for a lovely happy future!

Kate and Dominic's Romantic Cupcakes and Cookies

2010-04-12T12:03:00.013+01:00

The lovely Kate and Dominic were married yesterday on a beautiful sunny spring day at Peterstone Court hotel near Brecon. The style of the wedding was elegant, vintage, country garden chic and the cupcakes needed to tie in with this feel! Kate and Dominic chose four different flavours of cupcake: Sumptuous Chocolate (Belgian chocolate sponge topped with white chocolate buttercream, Vanilla Vanilla, Strawberries & Cream and Carrot cupcakes with cinnamon cream-cheese frosting. The top tier cake was a moist Belgian chocolate cake filled and covered with decadent white chocolate buttercream frosting.

Each flavour cupcake was decorated in a different floral style to tie in with the flowers on the tables and in the bouquets. The bridesmaids had beautiful dusky pink dresses and so we decided to stick to a dusky pink / cream colour palate. Each cupcake was finished by being encased in a beautiful filigree cupcake casing to keep the cupcakes looking sumptuously vintagely elegant!

Kate and Dominic also asked me to make vanilla cookie favours / place settings for their guests. They decided upon heart shaped cookies for the men iced in dusky pink and overpiped with cream filigree royal icing to mimic the style of the cupcake cases. The ladies were treated to either shoe shaped or handbag shaped cookies iced with cream cream royal icing and then piped and decorated with dusky pink sugar flowers. I made a special cookie for Kate with K and D piped in royal icing:

It was so lovely to see Kate on the morning of the wedding to see her reaction to the cake! Thank you for my lovely chocolates, and for being such fun to work with! I hope you both had a truly wonderful day! Wishing you every happiness for the future!

more iced in the press....!!

2010-03-17T15:43:00.008Z

We are featured twice in Wedding Venues & Services Magazine (a national wedding magazine in the UK) for March, April and May: Porcelain in the 'Dream Cakes' feature and our lemon wedding cake cookies in a collage of ideas for spring weddings... how lovely!

iced in the press...

2010-03-17T15:21:00.003Z

I was kindly asked to be on Your South Wales Wedding's panel of experts for the current March / April issue. The hot topic was flowers and the question related to the use of fresh flowers on cakes. This is something I get asked about fairly regularly. I absolutely adore fresh flowers and they can look truly beautiful when used as part of a cake's design. However you do need to exercise a little caution. Increasingly flowers are being grown for the mass market using large amounts of chemicals and so it's important to check with florists that they can supply organic blooms. Personally I love the design effect of sugar flowers. I love the process of hand-moulding them and the fact that sugar flowers can be coloured, sized and styled to perfectly compliment the proportions and style of a cake. From a practical point of view too, with sugar flowers you are guaranteed that they will stay fresh and perfect throughout the day!

Birthday Cupcakes

2010-03-08T15:50:00.000Z

In December I made Helen and John's wedding cake and cookies and was delighted when Helen asked me to make cupcakes as a surprise to celebrate John's 30th birthday! Helen picked five different flavoured American style cupcakes: lemon cupcakes filled with lemon curd and topped with vanilla buttercream, chocolate cupcakes filled with praline and topped with white chocolate buttercream, blueberry whirl cupcakes, gin and tonic cupcakes and Tirimisu cupcakes! Wishing John many happy returns.

Pretty Funky Cupcakes!

2010-03-04T12:35:00.005Z

I was asked to make these funky pretty fondant-topped cupcakes for an 18th birthday celebration at the end of February. Half of the cakes were madagascan vanilla sponge and the other half rich belgian chocolate sponge cakes. The cakes were decorated in a variety of styles - yellow cupcakes decorated with dasies and blossoms, lilac cupcakes decorated with roses and bows and also pink cupcakes decorated with a rose and butterfly. I love the colour combinations - they are just so bright and cheery!

iced in the Press

2010-02-19T15:02:00.012Z

Oh dear I'm very remiss with my blog posting! I've allowed almost two months to go buy without updating this site. I'm not sure if busyness is allowed as an excuse?! After a lovely couple of weeks off playing in the snow in January, I've been busy with wedding, birthday and valentines orders. I promise to catch up and post on all of these asap. Here are some snippets from magazines where iced has appeared recently:

WM featured the butterfly cupcake wedding cake we made for Claire and Tim's wedding

Your South Wales Wedding featured green and fuscia cupcakes and Porcelain.

Oh and look out for the Mar/Apr/May issue of Wedding Venue and Services magazine (http://www.weddingvenues.co.uk/) a national magazine here in the UK which is kindly featuring both Porcelain and lemon wedding cake cookies!

Kerry and Nigel's Art Deco Wedding Cake

2010-01-06T09:22:00.005Z

Kerry and Nigel married on the 27th of December at the lovely Marriott St Pierre in Chepstow. Taking place in the late afternoon, the reception was filled with candles and sparkling shimmering elegance. The couple's wedding stationery was based on a beautiful art deco theme and we decided to carry this through to the cake design. I researched art deco patterns and fell in love with the simplicity and elegance of one in particular, when I sent the designs to Kerry and Nigel I was so pleased that they chose the same one! We decided that the pattern should be piped around the top edge of each of the three tiers with silver royal icing (in keeping with the main colour of the wedding), when the pattern dried I then brushed the design with sparkle using a tiny brush so the pattern would shimmer in the candlelight of the reception.

Thank you Kerry for making the design process such fun! Wishing you both every happiness for the future!

Helen and John's Winter Wedding

2010-01-06T00:35:00.010Z

With Christmas and New Year keeping me busy I have fallen woefully behind with my blog posting! Two days before Christmas I had the great pleasure of making the wedding cake and iced cookie favours for Helen and John's lovely wedding which took place at Peterstone Court Hotel near Brecon.

Helen and John were looking for a dramatic yet elegant wedding cake which fitted with their winter wedding. The three principal colours we used to decorate the cookies and the cake - shimmering oyster, white, and a foresty green - were mixed to match the swatches Helen gave me of her and her bridesmaid's gowns. The cake, which was comprised of a base tier of hot toddy fruit cake, a middle tier of madagascan vanilla cake filled with blueberry compote and vanilla buttercream and a top tier of rich belgian chocolate cake filled with orange buttercream, was covered with dark green sugarpaste and hand piped with an intricate white royal icing design before being adorned with sparkling hand-moulded sugar flowers.

Helen and John also asked me to make cookies as favours for their guests, they decided on shimmering oyster and white vanilla bauble cookies for the ladies and shimmering green chocolate christmas tree cookies for the gentlemen.

We made two special cookies for the littlest guests - a christmas fairy for Leah and a Christmas dinosaur for Oliver (what fun!).

Thank you to Helen and John for being such a pleasure to work with. We wish you every happiness!

Mini Christmas Cakes!

2009-12-10T02:10:00.003Z

Appologies for my lack of blog posting of late. Amongst other things, I have been innundated with orders for these little christmas pudding cakes and I have been busily stuck in my studio! These dinky little cakes are perfectly indulgent for one and make excellent little gifts and a fabulous surprise in a stocking. Each cake comes packaged in a clear acetate box tied with a festively coloured ribbon! These diminutive cakes are made to order in a variety of flavours; the most popular to-date are chocolate fruit cake, hot toddy fruit cake and sumptuous chocolate. Yum yum.

Llangoed Hall - Best British Wedding Venue 2009!

2009-11-25T22:17:00.003Z

Many congratulations to Lynn Tonkin and everyone at Llangoed Hall which has been voted Best British Wedding Venue 2009 by Wedding TV. You can view the show here. We work very closely with Llangoed Hall and the blue and white cake we made for Lynne and Robin is featured in the programme at the trophy presentation!

Little Blue and White Wedding Cakes

2009-11-23T11:36:00.007Z

I made these pretty mini cakes for the lovely Lynne and Robin's wedding which took place on Saturday at Llangoed Hall. Lynne was such fun to work with as we designed her mini cakes. The cakes came in three flavours: chcolate fruit cake, lemon cake filled with home made lemon curd and vanilla buttercream and Madagascan vanilla cake filled with blueberry compote and vanilla buttercream. Each flavour had a different design in order to distinguish one from the other but we kept all of the cakes to the blue and white colours of the dining room at Llangoed Hall. I hand sewed tiny diamante buttons onto the ribbon which encircled each cake for a little bit of sparkly glitz! After the cutting of the cake in the evening the staff at Llangoed Hall boxed up each cake individually and placed them in the guests bedrooms!

The very talented Emma of Love Lily created the flower cake stand - isn't it beautiful?

Many thanks to Lynne for being so lovely to work with and for my lovely champagne! We wish Lynne and Robin every happiness for the future!

Pretty Poppy Party Cake

2009-11-17T13:03:00.018Z

Linda ordered this pretty poppy cake to celebrate her mother's special birthday today! Poppies are Brenda's fravourite flowers and so they had to take pride of place on her cake! The base tier is a hot toddy fruit cake and the top tier vanilla cake filled with blueberry compote and vanilla buttercream! Wishing Brenda a very happy 70th birthday!

White Rose and Hypericum Berry Wedding Cake

2009-11-07T17:03:00.017Z

This cake was made for a lovely couple; Sarah and Dave whose wedding took place on Saturday at the Miskin Manor Hotel. Their wedding colours were white and deep red to tie in with the white roses and hypericum berries in Sarah's bouquet. We wanted to carry both the white roses and the hypericum berries through to the cake and Sarah and Dave decided upon this romantic design of a loose garland of flowers and berries which trailed down the off-centre square tiers. The cake itself was comprised of a hot toddy fruit cake bottom tier and the remaining tiers with madagascan vanilla cake filled with fresh raspberry compote and vanilla buttercream! We send Sarah and Dave all of our best wishes for the future!

Festive cheer!

2009-11-06T01:43:00.005Z

More gingerbread but this time of the festive variety! I can't believe it is November already! My thoughts are already turning to Christmas orders: to christmas cakes, cupcakes cookies and ... gingerbread houses. This year iced are making bespoke gingerbread houses to order like our little house pictured above, we can make totally individual houses covered in favourite sweets and designed to replicate your own home! Festive fantastic! (More festive cake and cookie news to follow...)

Chibi Cookies

2009-11-06T01:27:00.004Z

When one of my lovely clients asked me to make her some special gingerbread chibi cookies to take on an anniversary weekend away I have to admit I needed to consult google! Having established that 1. I am a little bit behind the times and 2. that chibi's are cute Japanese anime characters I was a feeling a bit more in the picture! Ruth's partner loves gingerbread men and they are both into chibi design so we decided to make double gingerbread men with hand piped characterised chibi versions of Ruth and her partner in royal icing. Wishing them both a wonderful week away...

Black and White Wedding Cake

2009-10-26T11:49:00.010Z

I made this cake for Joanna and Andrew's wedding which took place yesterday at the Coed y Mwstwr Hotel near Bridgend. The wedding was designed around a black and white colour theme and Joanna and Andrew wanted to carry this through to their cake. Joanna's bouquet featured cala lilies and we decided to incorporate this into the design of the cake whilst carrying through the black and white theme. We used black lace ribbon from Liberty of London around the top and bottom tiers and added a subtle dusting of sparkle to the sugar roses.

The cake itself was comprised of a bottom tier of hot toddy fruit cake, a middle tier of sumptuous Belgian chocolate cake and a top tier of coconut cake.

We send all of our best wishes to Jo and Andrew for the future!

(PS. Many appologies for the graininess of these images my camera work isn't always at its best!)

Daisy Christening Cake

2009-10-25T16:45:00.002Z

This fresh, pretty daisy cake was made to celebrate the joint christening of two sisters, Celine Rose and Ffion Mair, which took place today. The bottom tier is a light fruit cake with cherries and the top tier a chocolate cake filled with white chocolate frosting. The cake is covered with white fondant icing and decorated with varying sized hand cut sugar daisies and a white butterfly. I then used white royal icing to pipe little dots over the cake in a higglety-pigglety fashion! The scroll at the front of the cake bears the names of the two little girls.

Victorian Lilac Cupcake Wedding Cake

2009-10-24T16:38:00.012+01:00

This cupcake wedding cake is comprised of 130 belgian chocolate and madagascan vanilla cupcakes topped with sumptuously gooey poured fondant icing. The cupcakes are decorated variously with roses and butterflies and daisies and piped with contrasting royal icing dots! The top tier is a hot toddy fruit cake topped with antique lilac sugar roses which have a little added sparkle to complement the diamante brooch at the centre of the bow. The wedding took place this afternoon at the lovely Parc Hotel in Cardiff. We'd like to wish Rachel and her new husband every happiness today and for the future!

Corsage featured at Cowbridge Food Festival

2009-10-21T17:18:00.006+01:00

This romantic cake is inspired by the vintage rose corsages which adorn its sides, I used different royal icing piping patterns in very pale pink royal icing to give depth, texture and prettyness to the cake! The piped work was then brushed with pearlescent powder to give a little shimmer and sparkle.
This cake will be featured as part of our display in the window of High Society Bridal in Cowbridge this weekend as part of Cowbridge Food Festival. If you are visiting the festival this weekend do pop along to High Society to see not only our window display but also to sneak a peak at the beautiful dresses and accesories which High Society sells!

Where I have been....

2009-10-15T10:52:00.002+01:00

You may have noticed a short impasse in my blog postings of late! After a wonderful summer making fabulous cakes for fabulous clients, I took myself off for a short break to Singapore. Singapore is a true meeting place of diverse cultures: the country is home to Chinese, Indian, Malaysian, Thai and European nationals to name but a few of the different nationalities which make up the population. While I was there it was, of course(!), incumbent upon me to investigate the effect of this cultural convergeance upon the wonderful world of cake and patisserie. I have come back armed with a whole host of ideas for new flavours and have been inspired by some of the beautiful intricate designs found in the architecture of temples and buildings, silk embroidery and exotic flowers. I can't wait to start designing!...

Dotty Stripey Sweet Sixteen Cake

2009-09-24T22:29:00.004+01:00

We made this cake last week for an end-of-summer garden party to celebrate Ginny's sweet sixteen! The cake was four tiers of different flavoured chocolate cake: jaffa (Belgian chocolate cake soaked with orange sirop and filled with orange buttercream), sumptuous chocolate (Belgian chocolate cake filled with white chocolate buttercream), after8 (Belgian chocolate cake filled with minty buttercream) and chocolate cherry (belgian chocolate cake baked with morello cherries and filled with vanilla buttercream and cherry compote). The theme of the party was dots and stripes and the colour palate shades of peach. The party was held in a marquee which was decorated with dotty and stripey bunting and the chair covers were tied with funky dotty ribbon. Fabulous!

Monogram cookie favours

2009-09-24T22:26:00.003+01:00

I've got a little bit behind in my blog posting! We made these pretty monogramed lemon flavoured lilac cookies for a lovely couple last week. The bride, who is from America, had a monogram theme running through the day and the piped design we used for the cookies mimiced that of their gorgeous letterpress stationery. Very pretty!

Beth and Robin's Wedding Cake

2009-09-06T22:00:00.006+01:00

I had the great pleasure of making Beth and Robin's cake for their wedding on Saturday. The reception took place at the lovely St Pierre Hotel near Chepstow. When I first met with Beth and Robin they knew that they wanted something elegant and sophisticated which would be a centre-piece for their reception and so I sketched out a few designs for them. They immediately selected this four tier design with chandelier piped royal icing and bows with diamante brooches at their centre on alternate tiers. The bridesmaids wore champagne coloured dresses and the bows on the chair-covers were in the same shade. Whilst we wanted to keep the cake to a white colour palate we used champagne white ribbon and matched the piped work to the ribbon colour to give extra definition. The cake itself was comprised of four different flavoured cakes: hot toddy fruit cake; Belgian chocolate cake with white chocolate buttercream; Madagascan vanilla cake filled with vanilla buttercream and fresh zingy lemon curd; and Madagascan vanilla cake filled with raspberry compote and white chocolate buttercream.

Thank you so much to Beth and Robin for being so lovely to work with and for taking the time to send a thank you message before heading for their honeymoon!

Sarena and Jason's Wedding Cake

2009-08-27T12:54:00.003+01:00

Sarena and Jason were married at the beautiful Llangoed Hall a week last Sunday. The couple knew that they wanted a cupcake wedding cake from the outset. The motif of diamonds ran throughout thier wedding day with little gems featured on the wedding stationery. We decided to keep the wedding cake to shades of white and silver for an elegant sophisticated look which would highlight the touches of sparkle we added to the cake in the form of the pretty brooch at the centre of the top tier cake and the edible glitter we used on the sugar rose cupcakes. To carry the diamond theme through we scattered varying sized gems on the table and in between some of the cakes on the stand.

Sarena and Jason opted for a mix of 'british' style cupcakes (vanilla and lemon in flavour) and 'American' style cupcakes (sumptuous chocolate, coffee and cream and chocolate orange in flavour). The top tier cutting cake was a chocolate orange cake.

Sian and Chris' wedding

2009-08-26T20:33:00.011+01:00

Sian and Chris' wedding took place at Celtic Manor a week last Saturday. Sian had spotted a design that she loved for her cake - three tiers separated by pillars, each tier vertically piped with royal icing and the gaps filled with white flowers. She asked Alison Bentley, her florist, to decorate the cake which we provided. The base tier of the cake was a retro fruit cake with glace cherries and walnuts soaked in brandy, the middle tier a lemon drizzle cake filled with swirled vanilla buttercream and fresh and zesty lemon curd, and the top tier was a Madagascan vanilla cake filled with vanilla buttercream.

Chris' grandmother was unable to attend the wedding and so Sian and Chris asked me to make her a miniature boxed version of their cake. They also asked me to make an individual fruit cake to a special recipe for one of Chris' and Sian's guests who has a dairy intolerance.

Sian and Chris also decided to have cookie favours to match the design of their cake and to bring in the cobalt blue which was featured in the wedding flowers and bridesmaids dresses. The cookies looked lovely and added a splash of colour to the place settings:

Many thanks to Sian and Chris for making the design process such a lovely experience!

Zoe and Mark's official photos

2009-08-26T13:05:00.012+01:00

I've just returned from a short break in the sunshine to recieve a cd from Zoe and Mark of their official wedding photos of their candle-lit cake and cookie favours from their lovely wedding at Homewood Park at the beginning of July:

A big thank you to Zoe and Mark for their kind thanks and for sending these lovely images through, it was such a pleasure making their cakes and cookies!

Claire and Tim's Wedding Cake

2009-08-10T10:47:00.002+01:00

Another beautifully sunny weekend for a beautiful wedding on Saturday. Claire and Tim hosted their wedding at the lovely Llangoed Hall near Brecon.

The very talented Claire and Tim designed their own beautiful wedding stationery in pale pinks and blues with a butterfly motif reoccurring throughout and so we absolutely had to feature butterflies on their wedding cake. Each butterfly was hand piped using pink royal icing and then over piped in pale blue, topped off with a little extra sparkle! The top tier cutting cake featured a piped design in white royal icing which mimicked an embroidery detail from Claire's dress.

Claire and Tim chose Raspberry and Vanilla Swirl, Sumptuous Chocolate and Lemon Meringue flavoured cupcakes with a raspberry and vanilla whirl top tier cutting cake.

Elephant Cookies!

2009-08-03T01:27:00.004+01:00

I was asked to design and make a set of Elephant cookies to accompany the lovely birthday gift of an Elephant adoption. What fun I had making these! All of the vanilla cookies were iced in pale blue icing with sparkly pink ears and sparkly green eyes. One cookie had the name of the adopted elephant emblazoned on the elephant's sign; the others simply stated 'Happy Birthday'!

Beth's Bridal Shower

2009-07-27T10:53:00.001+01:00

I am very much looking forward to making Beth and Robin's wedding cake this September. I had the great pleasure of meeting Beth's parents and sister Charlie at one of our consultations. After the consultation Charlie asked me if I would make cupcakes and cookies for a surprise bridal shower for Beth which was held at the weekend. The party colours were pink, lilac and green and so keeping to this colour scheme I made British style cupcakes in three flavours: orange, lemon and chocolate:

The 'shower' had an umbrella theme (!) and so I also made shimmery umbrella shaped cookies in gingerbread, lemon and vanilla flavours.

Geraldine and Paul's Wedding Cake

2009-07-26T01:27:00.004+01:00

I had the great pleasure of designing and making Geraldine and Paul's wedding cake this week. The wedding was held at beautiful Slebech Park near Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire. The inspiration behind the design came from Geraldine and Paul's wedding stationery by laser-cut specialists Chartula. Prior to our first consultation Geraldine had emailed me a number of images - of their wedding flowers, colour swatches and also a proof of their stationery design. The laser-cut pattern was so beautiful, incorporating the wild garden feel of Slebech Park and Geraldine and Paul's initials that I sketched out a design for the cake which involved replicating the stationery design on the middle tier of the cake using piped royal icing.

The cake itself was a trio of cherries: the bottom tier cherry almond fruit cake, the middle tier chocolate chunk cake filled with fresh cherry compote and chocolate ganache and the top tier madagascan vanilla sponge filled with fresh cherry compote and vanilla buttercream.

Baby Shower Cookies

2009-07-19T01:25:00.006+01:00

Baby showers are yet another lovely idea which we have transported across the pond from America. They are a wonderful excuse for ladies (and men too should they fancy) to gather together before (or sometimes after) the birth of a baby to offer support and friendship and they are a fabulous reminder to the mum to be that she has a network of friends to call upon after such a life changing experience. Typically guests bring small gifts for the baby and the hostess (normally a close friend) organises drinks and nibbles for the guests to feast upon. There's no more perfect fare for baby showers than cupcakes and cookies in my opinion! I made these cookies for a shower just last week:

Summer Garden Cupcakes

2009-07-10T01:29:00.000+01:00

I love pink and green together. If you choose pale pastel colours you will have a pretty vintage chic effect, - with deeper fuscia tones you get a vibrant, funky romantic feast for the eyes. Lovely. These british style cupcakes topped with poured fondant icing are decorated with vine-like white royal icing tendrils and intricate hand moulded roses.

Pretty in pink

2009-07-05T21:51:00.016+01:00

Earlier this year I was contacted by a lovely lady who had seen iced's cupcakes at a friends wedding and wanted us to make her cake for her wedding at Homewood Park located just outside Bath. It was an absolute pleasure working with Zoe and Mark to design their cake. They picked four different flavoured cupcakes: sumptuous chocolate (moist belgian chocolate cake with white chocolate buttercream), ginger lemon (ginger cake with zesty lemon buttercream frosting) vanilla vanilla and carrot cake, which were decorated with handmade sugar roses, butterflies, daisy clusters and gerberas. The top tier cake was a lemon drizzle cake sandwiched with lemon buttercream.

We kept to a colour palate of white and varying shades of pink to match the wedding flowers and bridesmaid's dresses. The couple also decided to order iced cookies for their wedding favours. We made rugby ball shaped chocolate cookies for the men with a hint of cobalt blue to match their neckties, four mini heart shaped vanilla cookies in different shades of pink for the ladies and special sparkly vanilla teddybear cookies for the little guests. Zoe hand wrote tags for each cookie with the guest's name on the front and a personal message on the reverse which was a lovely personal touch.

Many thanks also to Zoe's wedding planner, Julie from The Wedding Genie who ensured the whole set up process was fantastically smooth!

A little bit of love

2009-06-22T10:53:00.005+01:00

Pretty, summery, vibrant and funky: heart shaped, hand-iced and hand-piped vanilla cookies.

Floria Cupcakes

2009-06-15T01:27:00.003+01:00

The brief for these cupcakes for a garden engagement party was that they had to be pretty, pink, romantic and floral! The cakes were handed out on silver platters so we definitely wanted to use the silver cupcake cases to carry the theme through.

Colourful Cupcakes!

2009-06-12T01:13:00.010+01:00

Sumptuous chocolate; mint chocolate chip; mango madness; jaffa; chocolate raspberry whirl and tiramisu cupcakes make up this fresh and pretty wedding cake, which was topped with a chocolate top tier cake filled with white chocolate ganache and wrapped in milk chocolate - a special request by the lovely Hayley for her chocolate loving husband-to-be, Shahid. Each flavour cake has a different decoration (bows, daisies, orchids, roses and butterflies, glitter and blossoms) based on an ivory colour palate with hints of pink and green and we provided a cupcake menu for guests to select their flavour of choice.

The wedding took place just next door to Roath Park Lake. What a beautiful location and what a beautiful day!

iced in the press

2009-06-10T15:23:00.003+01:00

'Butterfly' is currently being featured in the June/July/August issue of Wedding Venues and Services!

The cake is featured on the contents page beneath an image of a beautiful Stephanie Allin dress and again in a feature entitled Feast Your Eyes! 'Butterfly' is a cake of understated elegance and pretty simplicity, perfect for a fresh summery wedding.

Stately Home Cake!

2009-06-08T00:37:00.009+01:00

I was commissioned to make a very special party cake to celebrate the 80th birthday of a gentleman called Wallie. Wallie's passion is for history and in particular historical houses. His daughter-in-law informed me that he is a keen visitor to National Trust properties and so for his birthday I designed him his very own stately home cake which was adorned with his monogrammed initials piped onto the pediment:

Tea Party - 1920's style

2009-06-03T09:10:00.007+01:00

On the hottest weekend I can remember for a long time, 17 ladies made the trip from London to Wales to celebrate Rachel's forthcoming wedding. They hired a lodge in the Vale and had a weekend of festivities. On the Saturday they asked iced to organise a 1920's style tea party. The weather couldn't have been more perfect and so we set the tea up outside next to the swimming pool of the lodge. The ladies dressed up in 1920's fashions and learnt to charleston to the music we provided.

The tea included fresh finger sandwiches, fruit and plain scones, teisin lap, vanilla vanilla cupcakes decorated with blue flowers to match the bride-to-be's attire, pimms jellies, lemon tarts and fruit tarts, chocolate covered strawberries, mini frasier cakes piped in royal icing with 'R's' for Rachel, sandwiched mini meringues and ginger lime tarts. This was all served on vintage mismatched porcelain dating from the 1920's/30's!

Many thanks to Rachel for allowing me to use the second two images which belong to her personal collection.

Lilac Lily Cake

2009-05-25T16:58:00.005+01:00

This is the lilac lily cake which I was asked to design for You and Your Wedding Magazine (a national magazine here in the UK). Unfortunately the lily was broken during the photoshoot :o( but I fixed it up in a jiffy and here it is!

Musical Cake!

2009-05-25T16:42:00.006+01:00

I designed this monochrome musical cake for a lady who wanted to surprise her partner on his birthday this Saturday. The gentleman in question is training to be an opera singer so we thought a music themed cake would be perfect! The couple love chocolate and so I made a two tier chocolate devils foodcake; triple layered with chocolate fudge frosting and white chocolate buttercream frosting. The top tier was hand piped with treble clefs and the bottom tier musical notes!

Wedding Cake Cookies: spring

2009-05-20T02:01:00.004+01:00

I love yellow and white together. I love the fresh springy, vibrant cheeryness of it, it reminds me of sunshine and cool breezes, freshly laundered linen, open windows and lengthening nights.

I made these lovely wedding cake cookie favours for a wedding at the beginning of May. The cookies were lemon flavoured and each was wrapped and tied with a white organza ribbon and placed on a square white side plate, lovely:

The Parc Hotel Wedding Fayre

2009-05-19T23:42:00.006+01:00

Many thanks to Marina at Marina Lois Events for inviting iced to be a part of the new Parc Hotel in Cardiff's inaugeral wedding fayre on Sunday. It was a great day and it was a fabulous chance to meet couples preparing for their forthcoming weddings. Our new 'tinycakes' were a big hit (more on these later)!

Cerys' Wedding Photos

2009-05-19T13:52:00.010+01:00

A big thank you to Cerys who last week emailed me some of the beautiful images her photographer took of the cake I made for her wedding back in December:

It's so lovely to hear back from couples and to see photographs of the cakes at the centre of the celebration! We work so closely with couples during the design and consultation stage and then in making the cake. More often that not on the day itself couples are busy getting ready (and hopefully enjoying a glass of champagne or two!) so we cake makers rarely get to see their reaction to our work. It means so much when they take time to keep in touch and send photographs!

The move

2009-05-19T13:45:00.001+01:00

Thank you for bearing with us whilst we moved from posies and pearls to this new blog. We'd been having a few technical problems with posies and pearls which meant I couldn't load up any new images, it's taken some time but here we are with a new all singing all dancing blog!