Jump to Recipe

I drew inspiration for this flower bouquet cake design from real flower bouquets. Flower bouquets make excellent birthday gifts (at least for me!) and I thought it would be quite cool to use the idea to decorate a cake, especially a birthday cake.

Poster for floral bouquet cake — Happy Birthday Cake with Bouquet - Easy and Pretty Flower Bouquet Cake for Birthday

This flower bouquet cake was designed for a birthday. It was one of those last-minute requests I received for a birthday cake. The cake was decorated with a bouquet of wired gum paste flowers. Although gum paste flowers would normally take a bit of time to make, I was able to assemble the cake fairly quickly as I had some extra flowers on hand. So, despite the design requiring gum paste flowers and the fact that the order was a last-minute one did not really matter. I could complete the cake within a reasonable time.

How to Make a Flower Bouquet Cake:

Tools used to make the flower cake:

Flower plunger cutter - for the tiny pink flowers on the cake
Sugar craft knife - Since the plaque on the cake was cut free hand, I used this knife to do the cutting.
Silver dragees - I used these as the flower centers for the tiny pink fondant flowers.
Round piping tip #2 - to pipe the border for the fondant plaque as well as to pipe the 'Happy Birthday' wording on it.
Satin ribbon, floral net and floral tape to make the gum paste flower bouquet.
Cake decorating brush - I used a damp brush to attach the pink flowers on the cake

The cake, frosting and the decoration:

Cake - One 6 inches by 10 inches rectangle cake. The cake itself was a single layer cake and I used my chocolate cake recipe to bake the cake.
Buttercream - I used buttercream to crumb coat the cake before covering it with fondant.
Gum paste flowers – the flowers were all handmade. Like I mentioned earlier, I made use of whatever flowers I had in stock to come up with the bouquet. So I had calla lilies, petunias, and carnations as the main flowers and some tiny filler flowers. I made sure the flowers were matching with the cake though. I also had some green gum paste leaves in the bouquet. All the flowers and leaves were wired, which made it easier to group and tie them together into a bouquet. I have also used net and ribbons to fill up spaces in the bouquet and to make it look full. I arranged the flowers such that the larger ones are mainly at the bottom of the bouquet. Towards the top, I used smaller flowers. Overall, the bouquet was made to be in a triangle like shape.
Royal icing – I used royal icing to pipe the border for the message plaque. I also used it to pipe the wordings on it.
Fondant in white and pink– I used white fondant to make the message plaque. I cut it out freehand into a scalloped oval shape. In doing this, I made sure the size was just nice for the message and was in proportion to the flower bouquet. The pink fondant, on the other hand, was for the small flowers that were scattered on the cake.

Gum paste flowers on a white cake — Gum Paste Flowers for Birthday Cake

And here is how I assembled the flower bouquet cake:

I had the gum paste flowers and leaves on hand, so all I had to do was make some ribbon loops and net clusters and tie all these together neatly with floral tape. You can buy ready made gum paste flowers or you can make them your own. You can even buy these gum paste flowers readily arranged into bouquet. That way, you need not make the bouquet yourself and that will save you a bit of time too.
As for the cake itself, once it was baked and cooled, I covered it with a thin layer of buttercream and then covered with fondant.
Next was the birthday message plaque. I cut it out from rolled out fondant and piped the birthday message on it using pink royal icing and Wilton piping tip #3. Using the same colored royal icing and icing tip, I also piped a border for the fondant plaque.
I also used some pink fondant to cut out tiny flowers to be placed randomly on the cake. I then left them aside to set.
Finally, I placed the gum paste flower bouquet on the cake and laid the message plaque at the bottom end of the bouquet. I also attached the tiny pink flowers randomly on the cake, making sure they are well spaced out. These were attached to the cake using royal icing (since I had royal icing, I used it to attach the flowers onto the fondant covered cake. You can also use water or shortening to stick the flowers).

A fondant plaque with happy birthday message piped in pink — Happy Birthday Flower Bouquet Cake - A Flower Themed Floral Bouquet Cake

And that was it. The cake was ready.

A rectangle cake with a bouquet of gum paste flowers on it and a fondant plaque — Birthday Cake with Bouquet - Easy Flower Bouquet Cake Design for Birthday

Like this flower bouquet cake design? Here are my other posts you might want to check out:

Recipe & Decorating Guide (Printable)

Here is the full printable version of my easy flower bouquet cake recipe and decorating guide.

📖Recipe