Teal & Lavender Swirled Buttercream Roses 15th Birthday Cake
This is the last cake I have in my 2012 photo files that I haven’t posted (unless I missed one by accident!). This Teal & Lavender Swirled Buttercream Roses 15th Birthday Cake was done for a young lady celebrating her 15th birthday!
When her mom described to me what she wanted, I wasn’t sure I could pull it off, but when I was finished, I was soooo happy with it!
She asked me to do the soft roses… and somehow swirl together lavender/purple frosting with teal frosting. She also wanted a “15” on the cake.
To get the swirled effect, I did something along the lines of this technique over at Our Best Bites. My method wasn’t exactly like that (I made mine up that day and found their tutorial when searching today!), but that’s the closest I can find to how I did it!
For the 15, I found a font I like, resized the “15” to a good size for toppers and printed it out. Then I rolled out some gum paste really thin, smeared a thin coat of shortening on it and laid wax paper on top.
Next I laid the 15 on top of it and used an Xacto knife to cut trace around the 15 and cut out the numbers. Does that make sense? You can see more information on how I make number toppers here. For these, I attached wires on the back to stand them up.
For the glitter, I “painted” them with some sugar glue, then sprinkled on silver disco dust.
Confession.. before I got his cake to it’s destination, the “5” broke at that skinniest point when I crossed some railroad tracks. I was freaking out, but decided to take them off the top and instead I placed them on the front of the top tier. It was just as cute (I didn’t get a picture), but was sad that the number had broken. I think next time I need to make them thicker or maybe not put them on until I reach the location. Or maybe the wetness of the sugar glue weakened the gum paste… I”m just not sure!?
Anyway, this cake was all vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream. For the colors, I *think* I used a mixture of teal and electric blue for the blue… and maybe violet for the purple/lavender. I use all Americolor Gel colors.
You can see lots more of my buttercream roses cakes by scrolling through them here. To pipe the roses, I use a Wilton 1M tip and you can see a tutorial from Amanda on how to pipe Buttercream Roses here.
Do you have any questions about this cake? Please leave them in the comments and I’ll do my best to answer and help out!
One or more links in this post are referral and/or affiliate links. Read my disclosure policy here.
Rose, when I saw this cake and the #15 I said to myself, I hope she tells us how she did the #5 and kept it standing without it breaking!! ha ha ha. I had the same situation last weekend. I had a thin flat #5 and when I went to sprinkle the front side (backside had the wire attached) with the disco dust I pushed just a little too hard with the paintbrush and it broke in the same place. I made a different one, but it didn’t dry in time by the next morning so I ended up bending a wire in the shape of most of the 5, putting my printed out template under some wax paper, melting some white candy melts, piping it on, spinkling on the disco dust while wet and then popping in the freezer for about 10 minutes! Worked like a charm. I couldn’t believe it! I then painted the back with the disco dust and stuck it on top of the cake. It then survived at least 3 car ride trips to its final destination! Whew.
Ha… sorry I wasn’t any help Angela! 🙂 It’s nice to know I’m not the only one who’s had that problem! I loooooove your idea about the white chocolate!! I will have to try that in the future – it sounds like a winner for a solution to uncooperative numbers!!
Is that disco dust edible?
There seems to be conflicting information on it. It’s definitely non-toxic, meaning if you eat it, it won’t hurt you, but it’s not exactly a food product. It’s sort of like crayons… if kids eat them, they won’t get sick – but you wouldn’t feed it to them on purpose! I only use it for toppers/decorative pieces that will be removed and almost certainly not eaten. If a tiny bit of it gets onto the cake/cupcakes, I don’t stress over it, but I wouldn’t just put it all over something that was going to be eaten. You can read a good thread about it here on CakeCentral.com.
Thanks for the info! I decided to go with something else.
Wow!! Now that I’m thinking about it, this makes me really sad because I turned 15 in February and I wish so very much that I had told my parents to get a cake like this one.
I am sooo happy I foung this post. I LOVE this cake, Rose. What size were these? I am doing one for a little girl tunring 6, but I am doing white and pink swirl effect roses with a “6” on top covered in the glittery sugar. When stacking two cakes like this, should I put the smaller cake on top on a thin cake board when I stack it? How do you transport a cake like this? Also, do you wait until your numbers have dried before attaching the floral wire, or do you insert the floral wire will the gum paste is still soft?
Thanks so much, Rose!
I have a tutorial for how I stack cakes here: http://rosebakes.com/cowboy-western-cake-smash-cake-how-to-stack-cake-tiers-tutorial/
I have a tutorial for how I do numbers here: http://rosebakes.com/how-to-make-fondant-number-cake-toppers/
Thanks so much for visiting!! 🙂
Hi, Rose
When cutting a cake exactly like this one, would you recommend removing the top tier first? Or is it okay to cut the top tier while it’s still on top, as long as there’s a cake board under the top tier?
thansk!
It would probably work either way.
Okely dokely….thanks!
How did you get the roses to be two colors? Its absoluteley gorgeous and i was just wondering how you did that?
I put the colors in separate disposable frosting bags, then dropped both of those into a larger bag with the star tip! I hope that makes sense.
Your cake is beautiful and I am hoping to make a similar one this week for my daughters 15th Birthday! Could you tell me about how tall the numbers were, just to give me an idea!
THanks
Maybe 3.5″ inches? My tiers are generally around 4-4.5 inches and the numbers weren’t quite that tall.
Hello, this looks amazing! can I please ask what size the two tiers of the cake are? thanks
Uh-oh… I’m pretty sure it was 6″ and 9″ tiers (or maybe 10″) but it’s been over 2 years and I don’t have that detail in my notes.
I am attempting a cake like this for my niece’s Sweet 16 party. Could you tell me approx. how much buttercream icing this would take? Thanks so much.
I never, ever remember to keep up with how much I use! I’m sorry!! I’d guess you’d need at least one of my big batches – maybe 2?!
Did you use the 2 bag method
or single bag method for frosting?
Love the cake…beautiful!
Did you use the 2 bag method or single bag, for the frosting?
Love the cake…beautiful!!
I use 2 bags – like shown in this post: How to Make Two-Colored Swirled Roses on Cake: Thanksgiving Cake Thank you!! xx
How much frosting did it take for 1 tier?
Your cake is beautiful and would love to try the one with turq/lime green
my problem is noone likes the buttercream frosting says its to sweet is there some other frosting that can be used also i am a complete novice with cake decorating
Buttercream is the only frosting I use, I’m sorry.
Me and my friend are having a sweet 16 birthday party soon and I was wondering if you may be able to make this cake for us!!
Where are you located? I only have clients near my hometown in Meadville, MS.