I want to use a cake stencil on the side of my brothers wedding cake but he doesn't like fondant icing. Can you use a stencil with royal or butter cream frosting on a crusting butter cream frosted cake? Any help greatly appreciated.

Yes I do it all the time

make sure you base BC or RI is nice and solid though otherwise the stencil will pull away at it and make it look messy. I just got in my damask stencils and tryed them on a dummie cake. I just did a base of BC and popped a few of the tiers in the frig so that it would harden faster and let me tell u the ones I waited and chilled in the frig held up alot better than the others. But man I am a stencil lover now b/c it looked awesome. Hopefully all goes well for your cake.

If you are doing sencils on a buttercream cake, let your iced cake set for at least overnight. The will help the icing crust up and it will be a lot easier to do stencils on. Also, using canned icing for the stenciling works real well. The icing is a nice soft consistency. Gently stir the icing a little before you use it. Of course any time your stenciling on top of buttercream, you will need to be a lot more gentle than on a fondant cake. But it definately can be done, because I do it all the time. And of course every time you use the stencil, you will definately want to wash it off in very hot tap water and dry it thoroughly. Otherwise you will run the risk of getting icing on the cake where it shouldn't be.
I know, it's a pain to have to clean it every time, but you'll be glad you did. It also helps to practice a bit beforehand on a flat surface, just to get used to the technique. Always spread the icing in one direction, and only use a very thin layer. Good luck!!!

I'm getting ready to try this as well. I've talked to several from my cake club that do this all the time and the most consistant advice was to chill my cake well so that the buttercream is almost hard and to clean the stencil after every single use. Good luck!

Thank you everyone for the great advice. I was planning on using a crusting butter cream but didn't think about chilling the cakes first. Great tip.

ACan you use royal icing to stencil I to a chilled buttercream cake? My concern is that the RI would bleed when the cake condensates after being taken out of the fridge for delivery and setup?

Ahttp://cupadeecakes.blogspot.com/2013/06/cake-stencils-are-awesome.html

This article adds to the above advise and offers more. The author is a great contributes on CC as well, the majority of her cakes are BC and they're beautiful!