Can I freeze a cake that's been decorated with Buttercream icing? What about Italian Meringue Buttercream? It would be great if I could make a few cakes ahead of time.

Not so sure about freezing them decorated, but freezing them without the icing is something I've done before. I dont think the icing will hold up too well if frozen and then defrosted...

Have to get some other people to post to see for sure...

Cakes for customers I have always delivered fresh; HOWEVER...... I have had a few cakes leftover from personal functions (Christmas, birthdays, etc) that were filled and iced in BC and froze beautifully!!! When we took them out and thawed, they were fresh as the day I baked them!! I even 'tested' on a few "victims" (aka: family) to see if they could tell or if the cakes were dry and nobody mentioned one word, mostly because they were too busy gobbling up the cake!! Nobody knew the difference!!
Hope this helps!!
~Jaime

Ladybug78, your experience sounds very encouraging.

yes you can freeze cakes filled with imbc.

I recently had some leftover IMBC that I put in a Glad container and put in the back of my fridge. Well, sometimes my fridge freezes things in the back, and the icing froze. When I thawed it out, the texture was ruined. I couldn't fluff it back up to use; it was like it curdled, or something, and it was only a few days old.

I don't know how it would do when it is already on a cake, but that's my 2 cents worth.

I only use ps buttercreams, but I have frozen a decorated cake before. I mistakenly made it a week early. All you do is box it, then wrap box and all in plastic wrap and then again in foil. Thaw at room temp and it is good as new.

.moving to Decorating forum.

.moving to Decorating forum.

I have frozen a lot of BC decorated cakes with no problem in the past (not at all dry and you would never know it was frozen). I am too busy to make fresh all the time. I even freeze fondant decorated cakes and combos of (my stocking cake).
I just froze the BC cake in a cake container. I have also frozen the cake for a few hours, then wrapped in saran, then put back in container in freezer. I would remove the wrap before defrosting. And with fondant, you defrost with wrap on, so the moisture comes off on the wrap.
However, recently I had 1 problem with freezing a BC decorated cake. I had made a Cave cake, had the perfect blend of color for the rock but when it defrosted, it ran and ruined the color. It must have been the black and white in it and the fact that it wasn't totally mixed in (because of the look I was going for) but it turned more purplish than grey in the end. I managed to salvage it by blending more, but it didn't look as good as it initially did. So, just be careful with stuff like that.

Would it be better to let it thaw in the refrigerator in saran wrap, or put on the counter?

I usually let BC thaw in refrigerator and fondant on the counter (as long as it's not too hot or humid).