Cake decorator Monica de Rumbea went above and beyond for our Bollywood photo spread in the May issue of Cake Central Magazine and created a whole dessert table with three cakes, cookies and mini cakes. Monica, whose business is based out of Guayaquil, Ecuador, took the time to tells us about her decorating background.

“I am fourth generation cake decorator, my great grandmother started her own business at home baking cakes,” says Monica. “She used bake cakes and petite sweets with french recipes [like] her french husband, my great grandfather, used to eat in France.” Cake decorating skills were passed down through her family, and Monica later expanded her knowledge at San Francisco University in Quito.

She began decorating wedding cakes and enjoyed the creativity involved, especially as nontraditional colors and flavors started to grow in popularity. “Hotels in town started to order my special cakes, not only for weddings but for birthdays, company meetings and even… for a divorce party,” says Monica. “I had the idea [for] a place where the brides could find their wedding dress, the wedding cakes and the petite sweets in one place, [and] that is how I started my shop Novia Express.”

Monica has been running her business and decorating wedding cakes for 15 years, but she never gets tired of it. “Usually I end the day exhausted, but believe me, when I see a… all of the petite sweets on a table surrounding a cake with a new theme on it, the satisfaction always worth it,” she says.