Venetian Mask Birthday Cake

This birthday cake was created for a 40th birthday celebration. I was given a free reign on this one which meant I could indulge my creativity.I went to Venice a year ago and loved the masks which come in a thousand variations and are amazing, beautiful, stunning and sometimes bordering on grotesque.

The starting point was the masks at the bottom of the cake. Whilst in Venice I bought a mask with no decoration on it. I used this a mould for the masks.

I rolled out fondant icing and draped it over the mask, I then cut out the eye holes and left the fondant icing to set hard. To enable the fondant to set sufficiently hard a added a powder called gum tragacanth which is kneaded into the fondant in very small amounts.

The cake itself was a combination of fruit cake and dummy tiers. Dummy tiers are polystyrene shaped like a cake tier and are used when the design of the cake requires lots of tiers but the number of portions required is less than those tiers would provide.Each cake/dummy was covered in marzipan and fondant (fondant only on dummies) and left dry out for 1-2 days.

With this cake I worked from the bottom tier up. I measured the circumference of the cake and divided it into 4 equal parts as I had 4 masks. I marked the divisions with pin pricks which would late be covered with further decoration. I stuck the masks onto the cake using piped royal icing and small lumps of fondant as support. I then stuck scrunched up kitchen roll underneath the masks for support and these stayed in place until the cake was given to the recipient.

Then I added the tassels which were done using a clay gun in which the fondant is pushed under pressure through shaped holes . I glued them onto a bell shaped piece of fondant which I textured and painted gold and then draped them down the cake.

I made some very fine frills to sit above the tassels and also made some different sized beads which I painted with edible pearlescent colour and used on other parts of the cake. The frills were attached while still soft and left to set in place. I left this layer to set before continuing.

I rolled out slightly thicker fondant to make the grey frills above the masks. I attached these while soft and then stuck a row of pearly beads on top of the frill with piped royal icing as glue.

The next tier up was done by firstly marking out a diamond pattern around the cake using a pre cut plastic mould which is pushed gently into the fondant to leave an indentation. The criss-cross lines were piped using an icing tube which would give a flat ribbon type shape. Once dry these were all painted with edible gold colour and tiny stars attached to each intersection with piped royal icing.

The top tier was then attached to the middle tier. I used the clay gun again to create tubes of fondant which were attached at random intervals around the tier and then painted gold. I used various tools to create texture between the tubes and then painted them with edible pearlescent colours. I attached another layer of thick frills and more pearly beads.

The top gathered piece was made by rolling out thick pieces of fondant (with gum tragacanth added), gathering them up on one side and then attaching the gathered side to the fondant on the top tier using water brushed on to the fondant. Once the gathers had set I painted gold colour onto the edges of the gathers.I finished the cake by adding feathers, flowers and gold wire curls inside the gathers.

It was a real challenge to get the masks to stay in place and not crack. Although they had set there were stress points in the fondant around the eyes which would have cracked if not supported adequately.

The cake made it in one piece after travelling into very rural Essex on bumpy single track roads and the birthday girl was thrilled.