Orchids in Orpington

What beautiful orchids!

Well, you know what kind of blog this is by now. Of course we like flowers … but we’re CakeBomb! So these aren’t just flowers. They’re exquisite handcrafted orchids of a rare species. So, given that you’ve now been told they’re not real, three guesses as to what our flowers really are. China? Porcelain? Opaque glass? Nah … sugar of course!

These rather special orchids are made from flower paste. We won’t reveal the species of orchid though – not yet. There is a competition still open on our Facebook page. If you can guess the orchid species by June 15th you can win a signed copy of Eric Lanlard’s new book Chocolat.

The finished cake will be revealed today in Orpington.

Our cake artist this time is CakeBomber Francesca Pitcher of North Star Cakes. Oak Furniture Land commissioned us to create something special for the launch of their new store.

Francesca said one of the hardest things about this particular job was researching this special species of flower that we are keeping secret. She said: “There are no cutters available for such a special orchid so I had to spend a day working out how to construct it before I could get going on the flowers for the cake.”

“The prototypes took a day, once I was happy with the scale it was a further two days to make the flowers and colour them. It was one further morning to wire and tape them all together – sugar flowers are very time consuming! I always find it quite amazing that you start with a bag of white flower paste which is essentially like playdoh, and by the end you have something like this.”

The cake is being presented today to a member of the Orchid Society of Great Britain by the manager of the new store.