90th birthday cake decorating inspiration needed

[silver28]

My nana has made a fruit cake for her forthcoming 90th birthday and she's asked me to ice it. I need to check but expect that it's round and about 9".

Does anyone have any suggestions for me? I have plenty of gel colours and prefer to use fondant icing, though am happy to pipe fine details or writing using royal icing.

She doesn't have any interests or hobbies other than baking. So I had thought of maybe doing a baking themed cake (tried googling but they're tricky search terms) or she'd be happy with something just pretty/floral/whatever. to be honest she'd probably be happy with something basic but I feel like practising as ive only recently discovered the joy of cake decorating and I don't get many opportunities and I suppose i want to show off to the rest of the family

I am ok at icing cakes but haven't done many. I can spend a fair amount of time on it if necessary as an on maternity leave.

Thanks

P.s. off to bed soon but will be checking in tomorrow...

Google the day your Nanna was born and maybe use that as your inspiration.

Thanks that's a good idea but it seems that fuck all happened on the day she was born!

I could of course theme it on an event from the year of her birth, but nothing stands out and I think I'd end up having to explain the meaning to everyone which I don't want to have to do.

This may be impractical dependent on numbers but put her at top of family tree and then children, grandchildren, great grandchildren etc.

And a candle for each person too (rather than 90 candles)

I did a 90th for a friend and they asked for a kind of 'this is your life', so I did various fondant bits around the cake, then put a star 'fountain' in the middle. It had a gardening reference, travel, and graduation. There's a pic on my profile but without the fountain because that was put in at the venue, hence the big gap in the middle! I get asked for gardening themed alot too, and they work well if she's interested in that at all.

flowers are easy enough to make and there 3d so they look impressive

Thanks for the suggestions.

Family tree is a lovely idea but there's quite a few of us and not sure how big the cake is (she asked mum to ask me to ice the cake do not spoken to her yet, I just know its already been made).

Mycathasstaff (great name btw) you have some amazing cakes on your profile! I like the idea of a thus is your life type thing. Not sure if she has enough interests to make it work, but I'll have a think. At least the cakes not too big, but then you have to put enough on to make it clear what the theme is I suppose, rather than just 3 or 4 random objects! I was she was into gardening as that eould make a great theme, but unfortunately that was my grandad's domain

And yes, I'm sure flowers would make a very effective cake and I could make it as simple or elaborate as I feel like. If anyone had any food designs I could copy then please let me know. I'm much better at copying things than being creative!

Thanks

Oh I just remembered, in bed last night I was thinking about this and considering doing a baking themed cake. Covering the cake in a thin layer of fondant then another on top draped like a table cloth, that I could paint a check pattern on to. Then make some baking things out of sugar paste (mixing bowl, spoon, bag of flour, eggs etc) and then a small sugar paste cake, maybe with the candle stuck into the cake.

Think it might be tricky to make the sugar paste items but as I said I have plenty of time, plus they're the sort if things you can do separately and stick on at the end.

If anyone's done anything like this before please feel free to share!

Carol deacon cake books have a couple of baking themed cakes. There's a cake in the form of a recipe book & a cake in the shape of a table with mini cakes on it. I'll see if I can dig out any pictures.

Oh thank you. I'm stuck with a round cake as she has made it and covered it in marzipan, so don't want to start hacking it up, but the second cake you mention sounds like it could be similar to what I was thinking of.

Here's the party table one

www.google.co.uk/search?um=1&hl=en&client=safari&tbo=d&biw=768&bih=928&tbm=isch&sa=1&q=carol+deacon+tea+party+cake&oq=carol+deacon+tea+party+cake&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_l=img.12...78824.99757.0.101302.32.17.0.15.0.3.216.1738.7j7j1.15.0...0.0.

This is the recipe book one but not a very good image but you might be able to find a better pic

www.google.co.uk/search?um=1&hl=en&client=safari&tbo=d&biw=768&bih=928&tbm=isch&sa=1&q=carol+deacon+novelty+cake+recipe+book&oq=carol+deacon+novelty+cake+recipe+book&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_l=img.12...48971.59151.0.60458.42.19.0.23.23.13.206.2308.0j16j1.17.0...0.0.mTErDW3sqI4

How about something like this box of chocs cake

www.google.co.uk/search?um=1&hl=en&client=safari&tbo=d&biw=768&bih=928&tbm=isch&sa=1&q=carol+deacon+chocolate+box+cake&oq=carol+deacon+chocolate+box+cake&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_l=img.12...46263.141552.0.142987.38.17.3.18.20.7.193.1975.2j14.16.0...0.0.JGKpnGBIOpA

Thanks. Each of the links takes me to a search page with various pics of her books, tho I think I can see the pics you mean among them. Is the party table cake in the front cover of one of the books (looks like a plate of mini cakes?).

I don't think the book would work due to shape of cake, but the chocolate box design is a nice idea and I'm sure would be a big hit with the children. I may just have to buy another baking book......

Sorry, just checked the links & saw they haven't worked properly. Yes it's the one with the mini cakes. Obviously the recipe book won't work with the round cake but I think the choc box would be easy & looks lovely.

Thank you Have a look at Cake Central there's some great inspiration on there

For my gran last year we had a plaque with 90 on and fresh flowers round the edge on a supermarket ready-iced cake.

Or contact a local cake maker to commission custom toppers (I have a friend in Essex if that's local to you, pm for details) loads of WAHPs do stuff like that :)