We had been wanting to create some cute little edible ‘Converse’ high-tops for a while now. We’d almost forgotten about this before we received a request for a lovely baby shower cake! For this cake there’s a definite concentration on various baby paraphernalia and pink and blue colours combined with crisp clean white.
When the customer contacted us they weren’t too sure what design they’d like so we sent through a few ideas including one idea that held the possibility of tiny gum paste high-top shoes. After choosing which style and asking for a few custom changes (like the fun pink, white and blue bibs, bottles, prams and rocking horses dotted around the cake) we then quickly sketched out the cake and refined the design. We decided on a pale pink and blue colour palette and added in the tiny pink and blue royal icing pearl border, polka dot plaque and the adorable idea of trimming the plaque with a fondant shoe lace design!
The cake itself is Madagascan vanilla with strawberry seedless preserve, silky Madagascan vanilla buttercream and wonderfully fragrant Satin Ice fondant!
To create the fun message we used this fun silicone mould that we stock in our e-store by Katy Sue Designs. It’s perfect for playful cakes especially kids’ birthday cakes, baby shower creations or themed treats. We love the bold rounded corners of the letters and numbers.
To create the tiny ‘Converse’ shoes we first sketched out a rough template on greaseproof paper before taping the pieces together to check measurements and trimming off or re-sizing any off sizes. We then rolled out some gum paste and began using our template to cut each piece. For a single shoe we used a sole, a tongue and toe section, a heel and sides piece than then wrapped around to the front, a strip to fashion into the loop at the back, a white half circle for the toe cover and small strips for the laces and thin panels around the base of the shoe. Detail was added with a quilting tool to add a stitch effect, small rounded piping tip for the shoelace holes and a large round piping tip and heart cutter for the ‘logo’.
Assembling and adding all of the pre-made decorations to a cake is always fun and it’s incredible feeling to see all that hard work finally coming together in front of your eyes. Even though we prepare pieces a day or two in advance we bake and stack all our cakes as close to the collection date as possible to ensure freshness so we don’t get to spend to long admiring our work! A few hours later any finished creation gets picked up and taken away to be devoured and enjoyed!
