Baking a cake is one thing, but creating a beautiful, mouthwatering cake is something else. Most of the time it requires a lot of imagination and laser-focused skills. Which is why we have gathered no-fail birthday cake decorating ideas that even a first-time baker can follow.
Why shell out hundreds of dollars for an eye-popping birthday cake, when you can do it all yourself! In fact, you can skip the baking and just decorate a store-bought cake. Easy peasy!
Feather Brushstroke Cake
Russian cake designer Kalabasa recently ignited the latest cake trend with her Instagram-famous brush stroke cakes. If you want to take a peek at her work for yourself, don’t search by the term “brush stroke cake”. That seems to be what US bakers have decided to call this look. She tags them as #kalabasa_feathers_cake. Whether you call them brushstrokes or feathers, either way, they’re gorgeous!
Via The Cake Blog
Suede Fondant
It’s easy to create and the effect is lush, rich and gorgeous.
Via Ashlee Marie
Sprinkle Cake
Sprinkle cakes have been popular for a while now, and it’s easy to understand why. Who doesn’t love sprinkles?
Via Sweetness & Bite
Black Velvet Nebula Cake
Inspired by deep space, this cake is space-tacular inside and out – white confetti sprinkles in a black chocolate cake, and the nebula painted black fondant!
Via Sprinkle Bakes
Simple Watercolor Effect
Dusting the petal dust straight onto the fondant blends them together beautifully. So ridiculously easy!
Via Sweetness & Bite
Chocolate Flower Cake
What could be better than a delicious and beautiful chocolate flower? A GIANT chocolate flower, of course! Arranged on top of a cake to create a spring dessert pretty enough for any special occasion.
Via The Cake Blog
Winter Birch Log Cake
Learn how to make this wintry, birch cake that looks just like a natural birch branch.
Via The Cake Blog
Tie-Dye
The liquid icing is just powdered sugar with food coloring poured over a fondant covered cake.
Leafy Lattice
Sometimes the simple designs are the most striking, and that’s certainly true with this Leafy Lattice Cake. A lovely cake for Mother’s Day, birthday celebrations or even for a garden party or spring brunch, this garden-inspired cake features leaves made a day in advance, so decorating is easy breezy the day of the party.
Via Wilton
Celery Stamp Roses
Great cake decorating doesn’t have to mean using intricate techniques or buying fancy tools (well at least not all the time). Sometimes the best tools can be found right in your own fridge or pantry. This project uses a fridge staple – celery – to create an oh-so-pretty rose pattern with a hand-painted feel.
Via The Cake Blog
Quilted Effect
How simple is this? Simply press the cocktail stick container lightly onto the fondant & ta-da, you’re creating the easiest quilted effect known to man!
Via This Mama
Gravity Cake
This one is unbelievably easy and yet looks so impressive, it’s bound to be a hit as a birthday showstopper! Best of all, you don’t need a special gravity cake making kit for this project, just one bamboo dowel!
Via Hobbycraft
Chocolate Cage
It just LOOKS fussy and complicated. Truth be told, if you can throw some icing on a cake, the chocolate cage will only add a few short minutes of extra time. And, if you can’t ice a cake so well, no problem… no one’s really going to see those mistakes anyway, as they are hidden by the cage.
Via Doughmesstic
Ombre Petals
A stunning cake with very minimal effort!
Brush Embroidery
A cake decorating technique that is so elegant, and so easy! You’ll simply need an already-covered cake, a paintbrush, and some thinned buttercream icing in an icing bag (the smaller the tip, the more delicate your flowers).
Springtime Flowers
The best part of working with candy coating (aka chocolate bark, confectioner’s coating, compound chocolate, candy melts, etc.) – is that you can create your chocolate accents, chill for them just a few minutes to set, and they are ready to place on your cake or cupcakes!
Via My Cake School
Melted Rainbow Cake
This showstopper cake is sprinkled with specks of rainbow colors and is literally dripping with a rainbow of colored ganache.
Via Tablespoon
Petal Painting Fondant
The look of finely-carved flowers on marble adds appeal to this fondant cake. The outlined royal icing petals are brightened with a sponge-painted color effect.
Via Wilton
Fondant Ruffles
Ruffles can look so effective but they really are very easy to do. They are also great for a beginner because they can hide all sorts of imperfections in a base cake and look so professional.
Via Rosie Cake Diva
Easter Polka Dot Cake
This Easter Polka Dot Cake is a gorgeous spring cake with polka dots on both the outside and inside of the cake! Learn how to create this cute, easy cake with surprise polka dots inside.
Via Sugar Hero
Drippy Ganache
How to make a drippy chocolate cake, with perfect drizzles of ganache, purposefully placed candy pieces and shards of chocolate.
Via The Cake Blog
Decorating with Fresh Flowers
Cakes covered in real flowers are awesome. Naked cakes are super popular at the moment, and with those rustic, cutesy cakes have come flowers – big, small, pastel, bold, spiky, flowing…you get the point.
Via Baking with Gab
Chocolate Leaves
Take your desserts to a whole new level by adding delicious Chocolate Leaves. They really are the icing on your cake.
Via The Whoot
Frost a Rose Cake
If decadence, beauty, and twirls of icing are your thing—this rose frosted cake is for you. Covered in pretty, easier-than-you’d-think florets, the petaled look has quickly become Pinterest’s darling of cake design.
Via Relish
Faux Fondant Smooth Frosting
How to frost a professional looking cake with pourable faux fondant icing in minutes– with store bought icing! Get a smooth cake frosting finish for birthday cakes, wedding shower, and baby shower cakes and more!
Via Sweet C’s
Autumn Leaves in Chocolate
This cake design features a simple idea and method for creating a vibrant autumn themed cake that is as unique as it is beautiful. This design would be perfect for any fall occasion, or on your Thanksgiving dessert table.
Via My Cake School
Decorate with Bubble Wrap
All of the time baking plus the layers and decorations are time-consuming and take a level of artful skill to achieve. What tools do you usually use to decorate cakes? Piping bags, or balloon, lace? Have you ever heard of using bubble wrap as a tool in the creative-baking process of a cake?
Via Cool Creativity
Didn’t think it was that easy, did you? These birthday cake decorating ideas takes away the fear of making your own cake creations. Who knows what these ideas can turn into if you mix and match them.
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