Cake designs are constantly changing and becoming more intricate! We can learn countless new cake design techniques and cake trends. Not to mention the new cake decorating supplies that we can experiment with! 🙂 Adding texture to your cake designs is one cake technique that is guaranteed to impress your guests (or customers). There are many cake decorating techniques to help you achieve texture in your cakes! In this post, we’ll discuss 10 Easy Tips for Adding Texture to your Cake Designs!
Understanding Cake Texture
When we refer to adding texture to cakes, we’re talking about adding some depth and dimension to the cake design. Let’s avoid the classic smooth cakes, with buttercream rosettes or buttercream roses on top and some sprinkles. Keep those kinds of cake designs at the grocery store 😉
Adding texture to your cake designs is so important for creating a visual masterpiece that is guaranteed to impress! When you’re decorating a cake, it’s very possible to transform into an artist with a blank canvas! Some cake designs that I have made over the years definitely make me feel so artistic. I like to call myself a cake artist 😉
Some cake decorating techniques for creating cake texture are so simple and easy! Using one of these cake techniques can elevate a simple cake design just by adding some cake texture to it. It can make such a huge difference!
Easy Tips for Adding Texture to Your Cake Design
Experiment with Different Frosting Techniques
1. Decorate Cakes with an Offset Spatula or Palette Knife
There is so much you can do with an offset spatula and palette knife. One design I make often has a more rustic look. I work with a photographer and make this design for smash cakes for first birthdays 🙂 After I finish masking a cake, I gradually run a small offset spatula up and around the cake, while the cake is spinning on my cake turntable. The end result is simple but mesmerizing (especially if you create the same effect on the top of the cake, creating a spiral). This may be one of the easiest methods for adding texture to a cake. I demonstrated this cake decorating technique on Instagram, making a smash cake from start to finish!
You can also use an offset spatula or palette knife to “paint” buttercream frosting designs on a cake. Add just a touch of buttercream to a palette knife and gently swipe the buttercream onto the cake. You can create buttercream flowers or some abstract cake designs. Try using different colour palettes to really level up your artistic creativity!
I recently made a cake with the painted buttercream look, but there was an extra cake decorating technique that I noticed on the inspiration picture from the client that I’ve never tried before! I don’t know the technical design term, but the easiest way to describe this cake design is the look of touching wet paint 😅 If you accidentally touch wet paint (because you’d never do that on purpose, right?), the paint has that “lifted” look. And that’s exactly what I did with this cake! I used the back of the offset spatula and gently tapped the cake – creating this messy look. Don’t you love it when you can make a mess on purpose?!
One more cake decorating technique to add texture with an offset spatula is creating a scallop design with buttercream. Take your piping bag and a small round tip, then pipe little mounds of buttercream in a straight line vertically. Place the offset spatula about halfway across the piped rounds and swipe horizontally. Pipe another vertical line right beside it and repeat 🙂 You can also remove the offset spatula step and swipe as you’re piping. Still, the offset spatula method is cleaner 🙂 There are just so many possibilities for cake designs with one cake decorating tool!
2. Pipe Buttercream Ruffles
There are various methods for creating ruffle cake designs. You can use fondant and cut out circles, then use a ball tool to thin out and frill the edges. Then overlap these thinned-out circles and apply it to a cake. Or you can use this same fondant technique on strips, and layer them on the cake.
Instead of fondant, you can create buttercream ruffles with a piping bag fitted with a petal tip. If you want to create ruffles all around the cake, start piping around the bottom of the cake, in an up and down/wave motion. Ensure the wider part of the petal tip is against the cake (so the narrow part creates delicate and thin ruffles). Continue piping all around the cake, row by row. You can pipe the buttercream frosting in one colour, or take it up a level and create an ombre ruffle cake.
To create a flawless ombre cake, start with the darkest colour and slowly add white buttercream to gradually lighten the colour. We discuss more about ombre cakes in our post How to Create a Beautiful Ombre Effect on Your Cake!
Other than piping all around the cake, you can also pipe on only a portion of the cake. For example, if you’re making a mermaid cake or an “under the sea” theme cake, you can pipe the buttercream vertically and create a coral reef design with buttercream 🙂
You can even use the petal tip to pipe…you guessed it…flowers! Pipe and create flowers directly on the cake as you’re decorating, or use a cake flower nail and lifter to add it to the cake.
3. Create Waves in Buttercream Cakes
I actually made this cake design recently for the first time, and it was easier than it looks! I created this butterfly cake for a bridal shower (it was also an ombre cake!). First, I masked the cake in an ombre pattern. Then, when it was all clean and smooth, I went around the cake with a cake scraper again. But this time, I slowly moved the cake scraper up and down (with the bottom edge of the cake scraper at a slight angle against the cake).
I actually created a tutorial on Instagram demonstrating this buttercream wave technique! Check it out 🙂
This cake technique would also look great for a mermaid cake or under-the-sea cake. Make the cake blue (or even a blue ombre) and you can make the buttercream frosting look like waves in the water 🙂 Dreamy, right???
4. Fault Line Cakes
Fault Line Cakes were a huge trend a few years ago! Since I never received an order for it, I decided to make a Grinch-themed cake for Christmas (because I loved the 2018 film The Grinch so much!) and used it as a prize for a giveaway! It’s still one of my favourite cakes to date 😊 You can watch how we made this Grinch cake on YouTube!
To create a fault line cake, pipe some buttercream around the top portion of the cake, as well as the bottom portion of the cake, leaving some empty space in the middle. And the piping doesn’t have to be perfect! 😉 You can also use an offset spatula to spread some buttercream frosting around the cake (but piping is cleaner and easier).
After piping the bottom and top edges, use a cake scraper around the cake to remove the excess. Then, you can add sprinkles in the middle section, pipe flowers, or put an edible image on the cake before piping. This cake design creates a jagged effect on the cake, and you can also apply sprinkles along the edge of the fault-lined buttercream.
5. Striped Cake Scrapers
There are many cake combs available to create anything other than a smooth cake 😉 There are jagged cake scrapers or cake triangle scrapers, and even ruffled cake combs. But one of my favourites is the striped cake comb. Using a striped cake comb is a cake decorating technique that requires some practice. It can be difficult to create multi-coloured stripes without the colours bleeding into each other.
I have a trick for that, though! After you’ve masked the cake and used the striped cake scraper, freeze the cake for about 5 minutes. After you freeze the cake, the base colour is less likely to mix into any other colours you add 🙂
Now, to add texture using this cake design, add sprinkles or some piping designs in the bare lines instead of another colour of buttercream. Not a bad idea, right?! Steer away from the norm 😉
Incorporate Edible Decorations
6. Wafer Paper
I’ve only had the pleasure of using wafer paper on a cake once, but it was for a wedding cake that is on the top of my list (shhhh! Don’t tell the others!). I actually did a little happy dance at the venue after I assembled the cake because I loved how it turned out so much!
Get a closer look on Instagram at this wedding cake with wafer paper wedges 😍 I’m still obsessed with it!
I made wafer paper wedges for this gorgeous wedding cake (yes, I’m tooting my own horn 😛). The best part: making wafer paper wedges is sooooooooo easy! All you have to do is cut out a bunch of circles, then gently fold them in half. Line up the semi-circles at the folded edge and using a little bit of water and a fine brush, brush the edges and pinch them together.
I actually demonstrated this wafer paper technique on Instagram, if you want to have a look 🙂 Be sure to only add a little bit of water, as the wafer paper can get really sticky or disintegrate 😑
You can also use wafer paper to create tuile or ruffles. I’ve also seen some examples where cake decorators add some stencilled designs on the wafer paper. So impressive!
7. Rice Paper Sails
You may have noticed some rice paper sails on the wedding cake with the wafer paper wedges. There’s only a few, and it’s very subtle, so don’t feel bad if you didn’t catch it 😉
Rice paper is also a very easy cake decoration, but it won’t disintegrate like wafer paper. To create rice paper sails, you actually need to submerse the rice paper completely in water. Rice paper normally comes in large circles, so you can cut them into smaller wedges or strips.
Place the rice paper in water, and shape it as desired. Add some divots and wrinkles in the wet rice paper pieces, place them on parchment paper and wait for them to dry. They’ll dry in the shapes you created and you can add them directly to the tops and/or sides of the cake.
You can also add a shimmer or colour and brush lustre dust on the rice paper sails (as well as the wafer paper).
8. Sprinkles, Edible Pearls and Edible Glitter
There are various edible embellishments that can be added to a cake. Sometimes you’ll see them on small areas of the cake, or larger areas. How about ALL over the cake?! You can add sprinkles, edible pearls, and edible glitter all around the cake and easily add dimension to a cake.
I’ve seen a few different techniques for adding sprinkles all over a cake, but there are 2 more common techniques. The first one includes using your entire hand to brush sprinkles up the sides of the cake. In the other cake technique, you roll the cake in a baking pan full of sprinkles. This may be easy, but make sure the cake is completely chilled so you can actually roll it.
Utilize Fondant or Gum Paste
9. Fondant & Cookie Cutter Shapes
You can create limitless cake decorations with fondant and gum paste! But if you want to add some texture to a cake, minimalism is key. I made a 3-tier wedding cake last year that was simple and white. I used hexagon cookie cutters to make some white hexagons and used them to decorate the front of the cake. Cookie cutters and pastry cutters are great tools to create fun shapes and patterns on cakes!
You can also use fondant or gum paste to create a fabric-like texture to drape onto the cake. I actually have an upcoming wedding cake with this type of design 🙂
Try Stenciling
10. Stencil with Royal Icing or Buttercream Frosting
This cake decorating technique might be one of my favourites! When I was first introduced to stencilling, I learned to use royal icing on a cake stencil to add a design and texture to a cake. But in more recent years, I’ve learned to use buttercream frosting on stencils – which is actually easier and more forgiving!
You can try to use royal icing with a stencil, but the moisture from the buttercream doesn’t allow the royal icing to set. This is the same case with fondant. If there’s condensation, that moisture will affect the royal icing as well. The cake below is a great example. I’m not the proudest of this cake, to be honest. You can kind of see how the cake and icing look wet 😐 This is not a good look!
To apply a stencil on a cake, wrap the cake stencil around the cake and use pins or toothpicks to keep it in place. It’s important to note that the cake should be masked perfectly and as straight as you possibly can! This will help you apply the buttercream over the stencil evenly. Use an offset spatula to spread the buttercream over the stencil, then use a cake scraper to remove the excess. Remove the stencil and you’ll have a beautiful design!
It is likely that the stencil won’t wrap around the entire cake, so you’ll have to stencil in segments. So, start with one section and freeze or refrigerate until set and continue on to the next section.
You can check out this technique on Instagram with a baptism cake we made using stencils with buttercream 🙂 Plus it has dried florals and pampas decorations, which are another favourite of mine 😉
There are many cake decorating techniques you can use to add texture to a cake. There are likely more techniques than the cake designs we just discussed! But these will at least get you started 😉 You can even explore your creativity and try combining a few of them together! Like wafer paper wedges and rice paper sails…or stencilling and sprinkles. Cake decorating is limitless and really allows you to be creative 🙂 Comment below and let us know which techniques you’ve tried!
Happy cake decorating!
xo
Mich
Leave a Reply