Draped Wedding Cake (gold and ivory, decorated with fondant drapes and black and ivory flowers and feathers)

Fondant Draped Wedding Cake

Looking for a vintage wedding cake that you can DIY?

I had a coworker who was getting married, and asked me to make her wedding cake!

I was super excited to be a part of her wedding day! However, I was frankly a bit intimidated as she described her theme and started sending idea pictures.

The cake design she had in mind looked and sounded like more complicated fondant work than I’d ever done before. (I did make sure to tell her as much - in case she wanted to change cake decorators! But she felt sure I could pull it off. I appreciated her confidence - or at least I did after the cake was done!)

In addition, the cake needed to be able to travel a 4+ hour drive to the wedding venue! (In some decent summer heat, I might add.)

Suffice to say I was nervous. But having transported buttercream cakes over distances before, I was fairly confident I could deliver the cake she wanted...IF I could nail the fondant work! 

Armed with a video tutorial, I got started. I was surprised by how quickly the drapes came together, and how forgiving they were to shape and place on the cake.

While I still recommend practicing the drapes ahead of time, they're manageable for a home decorator to DIY! 

"Any tips for the fondant drapes?" 
  • Practice makes better! I made sure to do a few ahead of time before placing them on the cake, so that I could feel confident when decorating time came. 
  • Plugging 'fondant drape tutorial' or 'fondant swag tutorial' into a YouTube search bar will give you more videos than you probably have time to watch! The video at the end of the recipe card (linked at the top of the page) also gives a bit of an overview. 
Last two notes - 
  • If you need recipe idea(s) or instructions for stacking a tiered cake, I cover that process in this post, but I’ll describe the process below! Here's super-quick 1-minute tutorial on tiered cakes that I posted on YouTube. 
  • I also included some tips and pointers for making fondant drapes below in the recipe card. 
  • If you have any questions or hit any snags please send me an email! All emails via my contact page to straight to my inbox. 🙂 

(Disclosure: As an Amazon associate I may earn from qualifying purchases, and my posts often contain affiliate links. If you click a link and make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you!)

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Draped Wedding Cake (gold and ivory, decorated with fondant drapes and black and ivory flowers and feathers)

Fondant Draped Wedding Cake

Sarah H
Want a gorgeous vintage wedding cake that you can DIY? Here's how I made this beautiful fondant draped wedding cake!
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 0 minutes
Decorating time 1 hour
Total Time 1 hour 15 minutes
Course Dessert
Cuisine American
Servings 24 servings (varies)
Calories 782 kcal

Equipment

Ingredients
  

Instructions
 

  • First tip - if your cake is frosted with a butter-based icing, make sure it's well-chilled so you can press the drapes in without deforming the frosting.

Shaping drapes

  • Knead together a mixture of 1/3 gum paste to 2/3 designer fondant for the drapes. Gum paste is stiffer than fondant and sets more firmly; this will help the drapes hold their shape.
  • Roll the fondant out evenly to about 1/8” on a surface dusted with a mix of cornstarch and powdered sugar.
  • I’ve seen cake dowels used for the shaping step, but I used smoothie/coffee straws for this part and they worked beautifully!
  • Alternate one straw on top of the fondant with one placed underneath, to create a series of ‘waves’ in your fondant sheet and press them in gently. Remove the straws slowly, being careful not to stretch the ‘waves.’
  • Press the top of the wave into the shape of the drape you’d like – you can pinch the tops of the waves together (like I did in the video) or leave them alone for a looser drape.
  • (I used 4 longer slanted drapes and 2 shorter vertical drapes for the cake in the photos/video.)

Adding drapes to the cake

  • Once you have the main part of the drape shaped, pinch the ends together and trim away any excess. I held the drape an inch or two away from the cake side a few times, adjusting the shape and length a bit to make sure it fit the area I wanted to cover on the cake. If it’s too long you can pinch the ends together a bit more closely and trim the excess again.
  • With some edible glue, brush the sides of your cake to help adhere the fondant. (Again; make sure to have the cake well-chilled for this part!) Press gently but firmly until well adhered. I also used some plastic silk flowers with long stems to decorate - this allowed me to press the stems in through the edges of the drapes to make sure they wouldn't move during transport.
  • (Optional - you'll see an airbrush in the video – the bride wanted a gold-tinged pearlized look to the cake, so I used a mix of pearl, silver, and gold airbrush color to get the effect I was after! I linked the airbrush kit and metallic colors I used above; its a great kit for a beginner.)
  • (One more note on the airbrush colors - metallic colors are grainier in consistency than plain colors, and have more of a propensity to clog your airbrush. You may have stop and run clean water through the airbrush tip to clear it a few times in the process. It was a super FUN process though; if you ever get a chance to airbrush a cake, DO it!)
  • After the drapes were placed and airbrushed, the rest of the cake decorating will be....well, cake! I added pearlized candies, ivory roses and flowers, black flowers, and a few artificial feathers (1920s themed wedding). Once the drapes were set and the airbrush colors had dried I packaged it in a large cake box for transport to the venue!

Video

Notes

(Nutrition information is an estimate for 1/24th of a 8"/6" tiered cake and will vary with cake flavors / decorations.) 

Nutrition

Serving: 1slice (varies)Calories: 782kcalCarbohydrates: 101gProtein: 9gFat: 38g
Keyword DIY Wedding Cake, Draped wedding cake, Fondant draped wedding cake, Vintage wedding cake
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

That’s all the tips that come to mind at the moment, if you have any questions please send them my way!

Did you decorate a Fondant draped wedding cake?

Send me an email and let me know how it went – or make my day and find me on Pinterest or on Instagram and tag @IntensiveCakeUnit in your photo!

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