I decided to create this tutorial on how to make fondant surfboards and surfboard toppers while making this beach themed birthday cake. I made a total of 4 surfboards out of fondant and 2 of them were used as cake toppers.

Fondant surfboards are really quite fun to make. I say fun because decorating these surfboards is open for one's imagination and creativity - you can decorate them with any design or artwork and that makes it so fun!
For this particular project, I attached 2 surfboards to the sides of the cake (and therefore did not require any support) while another 2 were poked on the cake as 3D fondant surfboard toppers ( and therefore were attached with 2 toothpicks each so that they could stand in an upright position on the cake.
Here is how I made the fondant surfboards:
Main supplies for making the fondant surfboards:
- Surfboard template - the template was basically to make sure all 4 surfboards are of the same size. The template I used for this project was hand-drawn.
- Fondant - I used Satin Ice fondant for all the surfboards and the deco on them.
- CMC powder - this helps fondant set quickly and firm and so I kneaded this into fondant before rolling the fondant out.
- Pizza cutter - This is my favorite tool when it comes to cutting fondant cut-outs.
- Extruder tool fitted with small round disc - I used this to pipe out yellow fondant scrollwork for the red surfboard.
- Star plunger cutter - I used a very small sized star cutter to cut out yellow stars for the blue surfboard.
- Flower plunger cutter - This was used to cut out tiny 5 petal flowers for the red surfboard.
- Clikstix numbers cutter - I used Clikstix number cutter for the number 18 on the blue fondant surfboard.
- Round piping tip - I used the round piping tip to cut out tiny white polka dots for the yellow surfboard.
- Sugar craft knife - this was used to cut fondant scrolls for my red surfboard.
- Needle tool - I used this for my orange surfboard, to assist with the turquoise lines on it.
- Toothpicks - these were used for the blue and red surfboards to hold them upright on the cake.
- Fondant glue - each toothpick was dipped into fondant glue before being attached to the surfboards. This is to make sure the toothpicks remain glued to the surfboards.
- Shortening - This was the glue for putting together all the deco on each surfboard.
- Styrofoam dummy - I used 2 round dummies, one was 6 inches, and the other 9 inches, to assist the orange and turquoise surfboards to set to a curved shape.

How to assemble the 4 different types of surfboards:
Maroon surfboard topper
- I will start with the red one.
- Firstly off course was cutting out the surfboard itself. With my paper template and pizza cutter, I cut out the shape of a surfboard.

- And then I attached 2 toothpicks at the bottom.

- Next was decorating the surfboard. For this, I used my extruder tool and piped out a long thin roll of fondant. With my fingers, I rolled one end of the roll to make it pointed.

- And then I formed a scroll as shown below. I attached the scroll to the surfboard with shortening.

- And then I formed another scroll and attached it as shown below:


- For the white flowers, I used my small flower plunger cutter and attached the cutouts to the surfboard with shortening.

- And this was how the completed surfboard looked like. I left it on a flat surface overnight for it to set completely.

Blue fondant surfboard topper
- Next was the blue surfboard. Since I was going to use it as a cake topper as well, I rolled my blue fondant, cut it out according to my paper template and attached two toothpicks to it, just as I did for my red surfboard above.

- For the deco, I used yellow fondant. This surfboard topper was to hold the birthday girl's age and therefore, I designed it such that I could put the number on it. I started with a yellow horizontal fondant cutout. My pizza cutter had 2 different blade shapes and I used the waved one to cut this horizontal piece.

- I attached it to the surfboard with shortening and trimmed off the excess at the sides.

- Next was the number '18' and star cut outs.


- I attached the number above the horizontal line and placed the stars randomly below the line. I then let the surfboard set in a flat lying position.

Orange and yellow surfboards
- The next two surfboards did not have any toothpicks as support. These were for the sides of my cake, hence they did not require any toothpicks as support. Again, similar to the above 2 designs, I cut them out using my paper template.


Yellow fondant surfboard
- The deco for the yellow board is pretty straightforward. I cut the ribbed vertical line in the center with my pizza cutter. And then cut the polka dots using my medium-sized round piping tip. I attached all these to the board with shortening.




- To allow the surfboard to set in a curved position, I placed it on the sides of a Styrofoam dummy while waiting to be put on the cake.

Orange edible surfboard
- And finally for the orange board. For this one, I wanted to create slanting turquoise lines on it. To do this, I cut out a piece of turquoise fondant using my paper template. I attached it to the orange one.


- Next, using my pizza cutter and a clean ruler, I cut horizontal lines as shown below:


- The intention here is to only cut the turquoise piece, so I was careful not to exert too much pressure when cutting so that the orange piece underneath does not get cut through. After cutting the lines, I used my needle tool to carefully remove unwanted turquoise fondant as shown below:


- And similar to my yellow surfboard, I left this orange one to set on the sides of a Styrofoam dummy until it was ready for use.

And that's my fondant surfboard and surfboard toppers tutorial. Click here or the image below to see how I decorated the rest of my beach themed birthday cake:

Hope you enjoyed this tutorial. If you have any comments or queries, please leave them below and I will get back to you as soon as I can.
Happy Decorating 🙂
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