Victorian Styled Cake

Cake with Lily and Pleats

About Wedding Cake Art and Design: Wedding Cake Art and Design: A Professional Approach

Creating the perfect wedding cake to complement a client's perfect day requires a great deal of artistry, technical proficiency, and a true understanding of each client's needs. Wedding Cake Art and Design is an invaluable and beautifully illustrated hands-on guide for mastering every step of planning and execution of picture-perfect wedding cakes--from the initial consultation to the gorgeous finished product.

Author Toba Garrett is one of the foremost experts and educators in cake decorating, having trained many of the top cake artists in the world. Here, she offers an all-in-one guide that presents sample client scenarios in each chapter, showing you how to plan and then produce the ideal cake to match each client's budget, theme, and creative desires.

This comprehensive resource explains all of the crucial skills and techniques required for success--from the most basic to the most complex--including how to create color, texture, shape, and decorative elements for every design. Exquisite full-color photos display finished cakes and illustrated step-by-step instructions provide clear and simple direction.

Garrett includes a range of different cake styles inspired by popular themes and concepts, including creative, romantic, textured, modern, and Wedgwood-inspired designs, designs based on the seasons, fashion colors, film, flowers, pottery, and textiles: and designs that are perfect for chocolate lovers. Truly comprehensive in scope, Wedding Cake Art and Design also features handy informative appendices on setting up a cake design business, recipes and flavor combinations, templates, and cake cutting.

Offering detailed expert guidance on every aspect of the art and business of wedding cake design, this is an indispensable tool for industry professionals, baking and pastry students, or talented and dedicated hobbyists.

To purchase Wedding Cake Art and Design click here.

Crown of Petals Cake
Flooded Butterfly and Closed Tulip Cake	Butterflies	Flowers

Afterword

In the end, only you can determine how successful you wish to become. Success as a cake artist can happen only with extremely hard work and a lot of dedication. There can be a lot of sleepless nights, especially when you're thinking about that huge order you perhaps should not have taken but took because you needed the cash flow. You may have days where you have only six cake ordersso far for the next two weeks when you should have 20 or more and you're worried about the payroll, and other days where you got some local television or national coverage and suddenly you have 35 cake orders to fill within a few days!

When it rains, it pours, and when it's slow, it's dry-docking. It's sometimes hard to gauge work in the industry. For the most part, if it's slow for you, it's slow for your competitors. If you lease or rent your own space, this might be the time to start thinking about doing some private or semiprivate teaching to those who have an interest in your cake art. Students and prospective cake artists always want to take classes, and once you make a name for yourself you have the opportunity to expand your talents. Teaching during some nights when you know your business will be slow would be a great start.

You also need to have a great sense of humor if you wish to remain sane. You get out of it what you put into it. In the end, it's the art that keeps on giving, and for me, it's the art that keeps me smiling.

Copyright © 2010 by Toba Garrett. Reprinted from Wedding Cake Art and Design: A Professional Approach, with permission from John Wiley é Sons, Inc..

About Toba Garrett:

Toba Garrett is head of the Department of Cake Decorating and Design at the Institute of Culinary Education in New York City. She is a member of the International Cake Exploration Societe and former president of the Confectionary Arts Guild of New Jersey. She is also the author of Professional Cake Decorating, The Well Decorated Cake, and Creative Cookies: Delicious Decorating for Any Occasion.

Left, author Toba Garrett puts the finishing touches on her Rustic Cake with Marzipan Fruits. Photograph by Lucy Schaeffer.

Photos and excerpt copyright © 2010 by Toba Garrett. Reprinted from Wedding Cake Art and Design: A Professional Approach, with permission from John Wiley é Sons, Inc..

Rustic Cake with Marzipan Fruits-top

Rustic Cake with Marzipan Fruits-leaves

Rustic Cake with Marzipan Fruits-orange

More Books by Toba Garrett: