How to Decorate a Cake with Flowers: What to Know
Gorgeous cakes can be decorated in so many different ways. Some stun with intricate piping. Others include detailed fondant work, stenciling, or even edible paint. Another popular way to transform the look of a cake and add a natural, beautiful touch to your wedding or event is by decorating with pressed flowers.
Pressed flowers are dried, then pressed, and make a colorful and delicate yet show stopping decoration for centerpiece cakes. These cakes are natural and elegant and are sure to draw attention to your cake. But what’s the deal with decorating with flowers? How does it work and what do bakers, cake decorators, and couples or other customers need to know?
Here, we break down everything you need to know about how to decorate a cake with flowers.
What Types of Cakes Work Best if You Want to Decorate With Flowers?
If you know that you want to decorate your finished cake with pressed flowers, you’re usually going to want to finish the cake with a smooth layer of buttercream frosting. This will allow the attention to stay on the floral designs instead of getting overshadowed by the icing on the cake itself.
Often, these cakes are featured at events with a botanical, rustic, or boho theme, focusing on natural elements and a more romantic cake design and overall feel. These cakes tend to be especially popular at spring weddings when flowers and trees are generally in bloom.
What Kinds of Flowers are Used to Decorate a Cake?
At ECBG, we use edible, dried, pressed flowers to decorate a cake. These flowers are real, delicate flowers that have been dried and pressed to keep them looking beautiful. They’re perfect for lending a romantic touch to wedding cakes of all shapes and sizes.
Although they are edible, we generally wouldn’t recommend that you eat them because they taste like dried flowers—they’re not delicious cake decorations. But we love them for their look rather than their taste anyway. The color and detail on the pressed flowers allow you to decorate a cake beautifully without using any inedible or artificial decorations.
How to Decorate a Cake With Flowers
When you’re decorating with flowers, you need to be a bit careful because dried flowers are delicate. Placing the dried, pressed flowers should be the last step of the cake decorating process. The first step is to assemble the cake and frost it. Then, you’ll make sure you know what the final design should look like before adding any flowers to the cake itself. The less you touch and move them, the better.
If you’re baking and decorating the cake for someone else’s wedding or special occasion, you’ll want to make sure you coordinate with the client on the design so that it fits the look they’re going for. Some pressed flower cakes will have flowers on the top of the cake or the sides of your cake. Others will have them sprinkled here and there all over the cake or create a cascading effect. Different looks can suit different couples, as can the varieties of flowers used, so you want to make sure you're working closely with them.
When you’re ready, apply the pressed flowers strategically according to your design as the last thing in your process, making the cake look playful but elegant.
While there are a few different techniques that bakers use to decorate a cake with flowers (depending on if you're using fake flowers, fresh flowers, dried flowers, sugar paste flowers, or others), including floral design on a cake is a great way to personalize a special occasion cake.
How Popular is The Floral Wedding Cake Trend?
It’s definitely popular! Since we started making pressed flower cakes at ECBG a few years ago, they’ve become one of our most popular cake designs. It is one of our signature style designs on our Cake Shop for celebration cakes, but people love it for weddings too. Pressed, dried flowers make a springtime wedding cake pop, working well for small backyard parties to sweeping celebrations. The exact types of flowers used on each cake vary, making that an easy way to customize your own cake and get creative as part of the cake decorating process.
Which cake flavors work best when you decorate a cake with flowers?
This style of cake is more popular in the spring and summer, so the best type of cake to decorate this way is one featuring spring and summer flavors! We love light, fresh flavors like lemon and fresh fruit, or delicate, floral flavors like lavender or rose. These sorts of flavors perfectly match the botanical aesthetic and feel of a pressed flower cake, making experiencing the cake a multi-sensory moment.
What kind of wedding or event would be best for a pressed flower cake?
There are lots of different wedding and event themes that would be suited for a cake decorated with flowers. Garden parties, of course, are tailor-made for a floral cake, but so is any event with a rustic or more boho or wildflower vibe. These cakes are stand-outs at outdoor events, as well as at any taking place at a nature-inspired venue.
At ECBG, we’ve done this design for events with garden party vibes, rooftop vibes, and backyard wedding vibes including at venues like Chicago Botanic Gardens, Garfield Park Conservatory, Morgans on Fulton, or Cafe Brauer at the Lincoln Park Zoo.
Floral cakes are the perfect blend of romance and nature, making them great option for couples who aren’t looking for anything too formal, but would still like something beautiful and refined.
What Should Couples Think About If They Like Floral Wedding Cakes?
If you want to decorate a cake with flowers, there are a few things you should know. The biggest pro with pressed flower cakes is how long the flowers last. With fresh flowers, you need to make sure they’re seasonal or available when you want to use them, but with pressed flowers, because they’ve been dried and preserved, you don’t have to worry about that.
Not only that, but with fresh florals, you’ll need to be sure that you're using non-toxic flowers and hearty enough to hold up on the cake. Non-edible flowers generally aren't suited to cake decoration because they aren't safe for human consumption. Working with an experienced cake decorator or local florist is the easiest way to help guide your selections.
You want to consider all of these things as well as what would lend itself best to the cake design. Very important to understand the personality and vibes of the couple.
How Much Does a Cake Decorated With Flowers Cost?
Cakes and florals can both be expensive parts of your wedding. If you want to decorate a cake with flowers, you’ll want to plan for how much that will cost. Fresh flowers are an additional cost usually provided by flower shops since you'll need to order the flowers that you plan to use on your cake. You would have to consider this additional cost as well as making sure all vendors are aware of coordinating how many to provide, the design inspo, and who will put them on the day-of. Sugar flowers are handmade by the ECBG team and start at $75 per stem. Pressed floral cakes are an additional $1 per serving.
Ultimately, how much your pressed flower cake will cost is going to depend on how many flowers you’re using and how intricate the design is, so working closely with your cake makers from early on in the process can help keep you from going over budget.
How Can You Keep the Flowers On a Cake Fresh?
Keeping your cake fresh and looking perfect is something we’re always thinking about. We try to put flowers on the cake as a final step in the decorating process. This will ensure they are as fresh as possible. If the stem of the flower is not sturdy, we’ll wrap stems with a wire to keep it propped up. Flowers do best when they’re kept cool, so it's a good idea to keep them refrigerated until you’re ready for the finishing touches to keep them as fresh as possible. Once they are on the cake, they only need to last a few hours, so usually they are fine for the length of the event!
Knowing how to decorate a cake with your favorite edible flowers can set you apart from other bakers and cake decorators. These cakes are perfect for couples looking for a more natural, romantic, artistic centerpiece for their wedding. The vibrant colors of dried flowers make layer cakes pop, whether you're using smaller flowers or larger blooms. They add a touch of whimsy and are easily customized to suit the occasion, plus they have the power to transform a simple cake into an elegant show-stopper, so it’s really no wonder this wedding cake trend is so popular.
