Weddingbee Blog

Last week I had the opportunity to meet cake designer Sylvia Weinstock. For the uninitiated, Sylvia designs cakes decorated with beautiful sugar flowers—they are so true-to-life that even up-close, it’s difficult to tell that they aren’t real! Here is some of her work:

A ginormous wedding cake for what I assume is a large wedding (or 20 guests that just really love to eat cake) Source

Flowers, flowers and more flowers. Source

Mini Cakes! I’m a sucker for all things mini. Source

I first learned of Sylvia when I was 12 - I was browsing through People magazine at the dentist’s office. It was a special “Weddings” edition, and while I flipped through the pages of dresses pretty quickly, I paused at a marvelous spread of cakes, designed by none other. The article detailed how she not only spent an inordinate amount of time decorating each cake, but also used the freshest ingredients to yield a cake that tasted delicious as well. I tore the two-page spread out (feeling super rebellious about it, I was *that* much of a goody-too shoes) and pocketed the pages. At that point, baking had become a passion of mine, and even though I had no interest in weddings, whenever I saw a cake in a magazine I would check to see if it was Sylvia’s.

Fast forward 16 years later - I am indeed getting married, baking is still one of my greatest passions, and I’m on my way to meet Sylvia to discuss the design of our wedding cake. The first thing I noticed was how non-descript her studio was - no big storefront or flashy displays here:

We were greeted by Sylvia herself, and talked about some of the wedding details. We then reached the moment I’d been waiting for - the samples! We started with the buttercream options:

From the back left (and moving right), that’s hazelnut, strawberry, blood orange, chocolate, vanilla, mocha, apricot, pistachio, raspberry, coconut, lemon, key lime, and dulce de leche.

And umm…. there were cake samples as well, but once that plate of buttercream was in front of me, I kinda forgot all about taking pictures. Anyhoo, there was yellow cake, chocolate cake, a white cake (like angel food) and one that I *think* was amaretto.

She suggested different buttercream/cake combinations, and in the end, we were torn between two. The first was light and springy: white cake with blood orange, lemon and raspberry buttercreams. However, as the Master is a fan of all things chocolate, we also put together the combination of chocolate cake with espresso, dulce de leche and chocolate buttercreams. In the end, we decided to use both! So the bottom layer will have the light spring combo, and the top 2 layers will be rich luxurious chocolate.

We looked through piles of pictures to get a better idea of my design style. I wanted clean lines, and liked something modern and youthful. I flipped to this picture, which Sylvia made for a photo shoot.

Source

I love it! Clean lines, not too fussy - with a splash of the flowers that Sylvia is so well-known for. I also like the delicate and subtle open pattern that is piped onto the cake. Using this as an jumping-off point, Sylvia then designed our wedding cake!

Sylvia with the sketch she drew for our wedding cake

(Even though I really wanted to take a picture with her, I chose to only take a picture of her - the last time I took a picture with her, I got nervous and froze, and I didn’t want to repeat that memorable moment.)

I know the sketch didn’t come out too well in the picture, but our cake will be three round tiers (perfect size for our ~100 person wedding) with rounded edges, with navy ribbon edging that matches the color of the bridesmaids’ dresses. Then in a lighter blue tint, she will pipe the open pattern directly onto the cake. The cake will be topped with a sugar peony, with some peonies on bottom edge as well. Simple and elegant, me likey!

And I’m *guessing* (just a hunch here) that Sylvia noticed how I continued to dig into the buttercream and cake long after we decided on the flavors. So, she offered a takeout box for us to bring the yumminess home. Yep, I visited Sylvia Weinstock and took a doggie bag home - typical Hammy.

Cake and Buttercream = Happy Hamster

My dinner that night

Do you have a baking idol? Who is she/he?