Avenged Sevenfold 21st Birthday Cake

When I got a request to make this Avenged Sevenfold 21st birthday cake, I had no clue what Avenged Sevenfold was. So, as usual, I searched the internet and found out that its a heavy metal band.

A square white cake decorated with Avenged Sevenfold image in black.

Avenged Sevenfold 21st Birthday Cake in black and white

The cake request was for a 21st birthday and my customer specifically requested for the cake NOT to be covered in fondant. And specifically requested to limit the colors on the cake to black and white.

Here is how I made this Avenged Sevenfold 21st Birthday Cake

Main supplies for the 21st birthday cake:

Cake - this was a single tier cake baked in 2 square cake tins measuring 7 by 7 inches. I used my butter pound cake recipe for the cake.
Buttercream - I used buttercream to fill the cake as well as crumb coat it.
Butter icing - This is just a stiffer version of my buttercream and I used it to cover the cake. It will normally have an ivory hue to it due to the natural yellow color of butter, but for this cake, since the request was to have the cake made strictly in black and white, I had to add white food coloring to make it really white.
Fondant - I used Satin Ice black and white but only in small portions. The black was used for the sides and wordings on the cake board while the white was used for the 3D font on the cake itself.
CMC powder - I used CMC for the 3D upright standing font. I added it in a very small amount to my fondant so that the letters dry hard and could hold shape when put on the cake.
Avenged Sevenfold edible sugar image - my customer provided the image and I ordered a print of it in edible sugar paper from a local store.

Avenged Sevenfold 21st Birthday Cake

And this was how I assembled the cake:

The edible image

I had the Avenged Sevenfold image printed in advance. In printing the image, it is important to scale it to a size that could fit the cake.

The 3D alphabets

Also prepared in advance were the 3D alphabets for the cake. I made these 2 days in advance so that by the time I put them on the cake, they were all firm and set. Since I was putting them on a butter icing covered cake, I could not use fondant glue to secure them to the cake (the glue does not work on buttercream and butter icing), so I poked toothpicks to the bottom of each letter so that they can be held in place on the cake with the support of the toothpicks.

The cake

Next was the cake itself. Once both layers were baked and cooled completely, I leveled and sandwiched them with buttercream. I then used the remaining buttercream mixed with cake crumbs to crumb coat and straighten the sides. Only after that did I cover the whole cake with butter icing.
You can see that this icing is super white on this cake, that is because I added white food coloring to it. I used Americolor.

Assembling the 21st birthday cake

Once the cake was all covered, I attached the edible image on the cake. I did not have to use any 'glue' here as the butter icing was able to hold the image well in place.
Next was the sides of the cake. For this, I used rolled black fondant and cut out a wide strip of fondant. On one side of the strip, I used my square plunger cutter, placed it diagonally on the edge of the strip (such that half of the square was on the strip while the other half was outside), and cut out triangle patterns. The other edge of the strip was left straight. I rolled the strip loosely and slowly unrolled it onto the sides of the cake, smoothing it along the process. Again, no 'glue' was required as the butter icing was able to hold the fondant strip in place.
Finally, I attached the 3D letters on the 21st birthday cake. And for the finishing touch, I piped dots of buttercream all around the sides of the cake. I did this on the black fondant strip as well as on the sides of the Avenged Sevenfold edible image. After that, I attached a long thin roll of black fondant strip as the cake border.