frozen palace birthday cake advice desperately needed!

[scottygirl5]

I'm in desperate need of advice! I've rather foolishly decided to do a frozen palace birthday cake for my little girl's 4th birthday party. I've only ever done fairly straightforward cakes before, numbers and simple animals, covered in butter icing. I'd quite like to do a cake with 3 round layers of decreasing size covered in ready roll icing but I wonder if I'm over stretching myself. How easy is ready roll icing to use for a beginner? Would I need jam and butter icing underneath to help it stick? How do I get 'firm' shapes to attach to the sides to make it look a bit like this? Do I need to make a madeira cake or would a regular sponge work? So many questions! Any advice from more experienced bakers much appreciated

[PurpleDaisies]

Ready rolled out icing is rubbish-it cracks when you try and put it over the cake. You are much better buying a block and rolling it out yourself. It is cheaper too.
I agree with everything osmio says above.

[TickledOnion]

I did a cake like that for DD1s birthday.
I didn't bother covering the cakes in fondant. I just covered them in buttercream. The panels were made from fondant mixed with some tylose powder to help make them stronger. I made them a few days in advance to give them lots of time to dry out. You can stick them on either with a tiny bit of water or a premade mixture of tylose and water to make edible glue.
Good luck.