Looking for innovative ideas to make your wedding cake stand out from the crowd? We’ve got ’em! From bold flavor combos to incredible textures, these are the trends catching on! Read on to find out more!
11 Super Cool Wedding Cake Trends for 2024
Hey, Christie!
Jordan and I are getting married at Ainsworth House & Gardens later this year and we can’t wait!
We visited several cake decorators and selected one. She gave us so much info on wedding cake trends that I am now really confused on what I want.
Could you sort through all the static and tell us about the most popular trends for wedding cakes?
Thanks!
–Taylor in Tualatin
Hey, Taylor!
I checked with the wedding cake experts with whom we deal the most here. Overall, they said that during the pandemic, those who married opted for smaller, more intimate events with a smaller cake than prior to 2020. Recently, with the return to larger weddings, engaged couples are expressing their individuality, their desire for cake grandeur, and are willing to budget more: for many couples, the cake budget quadrupled in the last three years!
The experts pointed out these wedding cake trends:
All the Feels
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Customized Flavors: To tell their story, couples are working with wedding cake designers to craft innovative flavor combinations. Popular combinations include:
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White chocolate, huckleberry, and lavender
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Vanilla and purple huckleberry
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Vanilla cake with lemon curd and mixed berries
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Tres Leches Mantequilla cake with Peach Puree
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Lemon, lavender, and blueberry
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Lemon and orange.
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Savory flavors:
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Teas: Earl Grey tea, Black tea, Matcha, or Chai
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Fresh herbs: sage, thyme, or rosemary
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Cheeses: mascarpone or ricotta
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Apple and brie.
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2. Texture: Seeking to add drama to your cake? Think about adding a simple stencil pattern or adding more abstract elements which could resemble flower petals, ocean waves, or tree bark.
3. Clearly different: By inserting clear acrylic tiers between the cake layers, the bride and groom can display items of deep personal worth to the couple.
These items might display something old, something new or borrowed, a photo of a pet, a photo of a loved one who passed on, a hobby, a memento of a first date, a family heirloom, a favorite sports team, flowers native to where they will honeymoon (or live when they return), or a sentimental item which shows the couple’s personalities and their journey together.
4. Your wedding flowers on your cake: You loved the flowers enough to carry or wear them. Why not put them on you cake? Yep! It’s a trend. Your florist can order extra flowers so that your wedding cake designer has exactly the same flower hues to match perfectly. The other option is to have your wedding flowers sculpted from sugar paste by your cake designer. These sugar flowers can be removed from the cake before it is served so you can take the flowers home. Under a glass dome, they will last almost forever!
5. Local flowers: Putting locally grown flowers, the state flowers, or wildflowers on a wedding cake is trending to give a very local spin to the cake.
The flowers might come from a grandparent’s lovingly tended garden or are selected to reflect the flowers in the garden which surrounded the bride when she was a child.
6. Pressed Flowers: While entire flowers on a cake is not new, pressed flowers are. These might be fresh flowers, dried flowers, or spun from sugar.
While adding an organic and whimsical feel to the cake, these flowers can also add delicate texture and gorgeous color.
Style
7, Vintage Charm: Couples are looking for inspiration from past decades and past centuries to design their cakes. Sometimes, this is expressed in a retro color pairing such as pink and green. Sometimes, it is incorporating a technique from the past such as Lambeth piping, a classic English tradition which allows the decorator to create incredibly detailed pearls, garlands, ruffles, scrolls, and more. For weddings with a Bridgerton theme, Lambeth piping is perfect!
8. Maximalism: Since the pandemic, couples are opting for larger and grander cakes. Added to the larger size of cakes are features including stenciled designs, layers of textures, bold colors, edible gold leaf, gilding, and flowers which turn these cakes into masterpieces! The goal is creating a cake which is as unique and memorable as the wedding itself!
Size
9. Sheet Cakes: We see sheet cakes at weddings in two diverse ways.
While the bride and groom cut a small, traditional tiered cake, the guests are served from the sheet cake.
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The sheet cake is a wedding cake! For casual weddings—especially those for an anti-bride, a sheet cake with decorations is perfect on the dessert table!
10. Mini Cakes: Instead of one large, tiered cake, couples have the option of smaller cakes on each table, each with its own design and flavors.
11. Mini Desserts: Mini Hand Pies? Yes. Bite-sized doughnuts? Sure! Brownies? Absolutely! Sugar cookies? Why not! Guests get to select what they want for dessert!
Let me know if you have any questions.
Your friend in the wedding business,
Christie Shyne
Images are courtesy of Pixabay.com.
Image of pink cake with Lambeth piping is courtesy of Bride’s.
Image of white wedding sheet cake is courtesy of Harbor Cakes.
Images below this are from the Ainsworth House & Gardens Website Gallery.
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