Behind the Scenes: Making a Cake Topper

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Custom Order Cake Topper for a 25 Year Rifle Team Captain Celebration by KatersAcres

Making a cake topper is a lot of fun. I recently made a cake topper for my one of my girlfriend’s parents. They were celebrating a magnificent accomplishment; 25 years working as coaches for the local rifle team. So, my friend issued me a challenge to have me design and make a custom cake topper in their honor for their backyard summer celebration. I thought I would take a moment today to show you the me making a cake topper (in photos of course) so you could see how it was built step by step, piece by piece. If you would like to see more “in process” photos of my work on the blog, let me know!

Are you ready? Let’s go behind the scenes in my NW Pennsylvania studio…

Making a Cake Topper: The Work Begins

The Making of a Custom Order Cake Topper for a 25 Year Rifle Team Captain Celebration by KatersAcres

As with all of my pieces, I make the base first and add my signature and stamp logos. For this piece I knew that there would be 3 main figures: a man, woman, and cougar (mountain lion) so I made my base a proportionate size. I started with the tallest of the two people, the man, and built him from the legs up. I then built his wife in the same fashion and placed her a little in front of him so he could place his arm around her. I wanted to make them both with their arms around each other, so after I added some of the other pieces I reposed the pieces as you see them here.  These two people took me approximately 6 hours to make.

The Making of a Custom Order Cake Topper for a 25 Year Rifle Team Captain Celebration by KatersAcres

You can see from the photo at the right that as of this point I have repositioned my figures arms into a pleasing “arm around my love” hug pose. These two love each other so much that I couldn’t possibly make them not hugging! From there I added the “25” which I also wanted to be prominent in the topper. To get this to not slouch, I prebaked it for 15 minutes to harden it so that it would bend or distort. I then added it to the piece.

Then, I added a cougar (which I was told looked more like Simba), oh well! I also added a roll and rifle at this point.  The finishing touches were the tiny shell casings and the target that sat behind the cougar. Time time to finish this section was about 5 hours. Then I sat and played with the positioning of the cougar (I wanted him crouching, but then he was too big for the people). I tried about 10 different positions and finally didn’t like anything better than his original pose (shown at right). All in all, this piece took about 12 hours from start to finish, not including bake time.

Making a Cake Topper: It’s Finished!

Custom Order Cake Topper for a 25 Year Rifle Team Captain Celebration by KatersAcres | Cake by A Flexible Life's, JenniferCougar print cake made by Jennifer of A Flexible LifeAre you ready to see what it looked like on the cake? My friend Jennifer from “A Flexible Life” blog made the cake that this topper sat on. She made homemade fondant and everything! I’m not a good baker, but I’m a good cook. But believe me when I tell you that this cake was sooooo (notice the multiple “o’s” for effect) yummy and good. WOW! I almost had 2 pieces, but I was so full I thought I might pop…so I refrained and let my hubby have a 2nd slice of cake.

Thanks for joining me today,

Happy Claying,

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7 thoughts on “Behind the Scenes: Making a Cake Topper

  1. Love it! I work the same way, from the bottom up. Thanks for the tip on stamping your signature at the bottom of he base. Will do the same.

  2. no the signature and stamp logos for the bottoms of all your pieces!

    1. Oh those! Sorry – I didn’t even think of those. A WONDERFUL lady named Tamara on Etsy makes them for me. Please tell her I sent you if you go to her store and also tell her you need them “Deep set” for claying. https://www.etsy.com/shop/RemarkableMarks

  3. I love your stamps! Do you have a link or site where you got them made or did you make them yourself?

    1. Do you mean the cake fondant? I did not make that, my friend Jennifer did. She used cutters.

  4. Rally cute, love this idea! Did you put the topper directly onto the cake, or did you have something in between as a barrier?

    1. I cut a butter container lid to match the size & shape of the base, and then used double stick tape on the bottom. The clay can not touch the cake or it will ruin the polymer clay.

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