I am new to cake decorating and am having a problem sugar-pasting sponge cakes. My cakes end up with bulges at the sides. Is this from using too much butter cream? also they nearly always end up lopsided. Is there a more professional way to preparing a sponge cake for covering in sugar-paste? Can anyone help????javascript:emoticon('')

Do you pipe a stiff buttercream dam prior to filling?

sounds like your problem is the filling bulging out. you need to give your cakes time to settle before applying the fondant, and a stiff dam piped round the filling will help too.
xx

Make sure that you level the top of your layers. A dome may result with the cake not being level, bulging at the sides and you might have cracking of the layers as well.

Thanks for all your reply's.
Several of you mentioned a butter-cream dam. Can you explain what exactly this is. I just spread the butter-cream filling between 2 cakes and then coat the whole cake in butter-cream!

I think they mean that you should use a piping bag and tip to pipe a border around the edge of you cake layer, to prevent the filling leaking out. Here in the UK, we would recommend that the layers aren't overfilled, as this casues bulging - also, we don't put thick layers of crumb coat on as this causes the fondant icing to slip and balloon.

Hope that helps, but one of your USA colleague will be able to fill you in on what's best