My Gum Paste Stiletto Class!

This past weekend I taught my very first class-- Gum Paste Stilettos!

I taught at the International Sugar Art Collection (Nicholas Lodge's Studio) in his Studio B classroom.

The class was 2 days-- Saturday 10-4 and Sunday 10-5, and we managed to finish more or less on time!  Not bad for my first go round... :)

At the end of class, we lined up all our shoes for a photo shoot.  Don't these look like they're straight out of Carrie Bradshaw's closet?

Everybody made 2 stilettos, and there were no significant casualties.  I think everyone did an awesome job.

Up close so you can see the details...


I had a blast and I hope my students did too!

Now I need to work really hard on my competition cake for the end of the month because I'm already way behind schedule. :)

And a couple more shoes...

So in prepping for my class this weekend, I made this pair of shoes in... odd... colors.  Although they came out a little bit psychedelic, don't you think? The have a little bit of a 1960's thing going on.

Anyway, I apologize for my lack of posts for the last few weeks.  I've been swamped with school work this semester and just turned in another conference paper on Friday.  This week I'm gearing up for my class and then I'll be focused on some competition entries for the Florida I.C.E.D. Cake Competition on March 27!

The tricky part is, I'm going skiing for my spring break the week before, so everything needs to be done before I go... I guess I'd better get started!  And I might need to rent a car to drive down there, because god forbid I design a cake with constraints in mind, like fitting through my car door... :)

Valentine's Inspired Gum Paste Stiletto

This week I made a Valentine's inspired gum paste stiletto to be displayed at the International Sugar Art Collection (Nicholas Lodge's studio).  It's on display to promote my new class coming up the first weekend in March!

You can find the details about the class here: My class!

The shoe was constructed similarly to the red/ leopard print shoe posted last month, only instead of the zipper I created a large buckle and added a ruffle up the middle strap.  To add a little valentine's flair, I added a pink heart to the shoe lining.

I'm so excited about the class and about developing some new high heel styles... And about the real shoes I just ordered from DSW. ;)

Have a great week!

2011 Birthday Cake

Yes, I cheated a little. ;)

I used the same cake that I had the gum paste stiletto on (in my previous post) and after removing the stiletto, made it a two tier cake that I brought to my joint birthday party.  The bottom tier is a 10" round in butter cake with Kahlua icing.

The 6" cake was was chocolate with chocolate buttercream, covered in red fondant, and I tried a new technique/ medium called SugarVeil.  I used the SugarVeil icing colored black to create the fishnet effect that I draped over the cake.  SugarVeil icing is related to royal icing but goes through a 'flexible' stage when it is dry on the surface but can be manipulated like fabric.  I got some as a gift from my parents for my birthday-- thanks Mom and Dad! :)

I also added some isomalt gem stones to the top tier and finished it with a fondant bow in black and cheetah.

Happy Birthday to me! :)

A Walk on the Wild Side-- Gum Paste Stiletto Cake

So you should recognize the gum paste stiletto from my post earlier this month. :)

I had to strike a compromise, because while I was dying to use it on a cake, I didn't want to do anything to damage it since I'll be teaching a class on making that particular stiletto along with another one.  So I didn't want to destroy my prototype.

So I made a cake that I could sit it on to take some pictures, and then carefully removed it. :)

The cake was covered in ivory fondant and then textured and hand dusted and painted to reflect the cheetah pattern on the stiletto.  I finished it with some black fondant ribbons and a black magic gum paste rose.

Advanced Royal Icing Class

This past weekend I took another Nicholas Lodge class-- Advanced Royal Icing Techniques. :)  I decided to treat myself since my birthday is on Friday.

The class covered figure piping (which I hadn't really tried before), as well as color flow techniques, pressure piping, string work with and without bridges, and some Lambeth style borders.   In the above picture, the doves were piped on waxed paper separately, and the ribbon side design was transferred onto the cake and created using a color flow approach.


Here is an example of figure piping-- this cupid was all piped with royal icing tips 1 and 2:

As a contrast, the cupid on the right side of this picture was cut out of gum paste and then over-piped with a little royal icing for added detail.

Here's some stringwork with a piped bridge and lace points, with an embroidery side design.

And here are some pressure piped letters painted silver and then attached to the cake:

We did one more dummy cake in class featuring a color flow swan and some Lambeth style borders:

The swan has some 'real' feathers in there for added detail. :)


I was a little rushed at the end of class so you can see that my scroll under the scroll border started floating down as I went along.... but I like the top border.

The class was great fun and definitely inspired me to work more with royal icing... and to reopen my Lambeth book and try a few things. :)

Meanwhile, I'm going to be teaching my first sugar class in March!!  I'll be teaching gum paste stilettos March 5-6 at International Sugar Art Collection's Studio B in Norcross, GA.  Details will be posted soon at www.nicholaslodge.com.

So in the meantime, I've been refining my shoe techniques and preparing course notes-- I'm really excited for the class and really want it to go well!

That's all for now.  Hopefully I'll still have enough time to make a snazzy birthday cake this weekend... :)

We've been featured!

A few of my cakes have been featured on Cake Mom!

You can see the post here:
http://jamielz.blogspot.com/2011/01/reader-cakes-cakes-by-roxanne.html

If you haven't checked out Cake Mom, she has a lovely blog with tons of great giveaways!