I'm making a hello kitty stacked cake and the lady wants the bottom cake to be white with pink stripes and the second to be white with pink polka dots. The catch is she doesn't want it done in fondant, but wants it to look that way.

This is what I was thinking of doing, no idea if it would work though. Frosting the cake white then removing the frosting where I wanted the pink and filling in the space. Then using the viva method to smooth everything over and give the fondant look. Would that even work?

Help and advice would be greatly appreciated!

I wouldn't remove it, just use the viva over what you piped to help smooth it down some.

And sometimes you have to tell the customer that you can only do things a certain way. Or if you do it all in buttercream it won't look the same as a fondant cake would.

I wouldn't remove it either. I've piped different colors on and waited for it to crust a little, then smoothed over it. I've done camo like that and also tie-dye.

I agree with pbeckwith. Just pipe the BC on the bottom tier in stripes next to each other. Let it crust. Then smooth with a foam roller, viva may work too. I did this on the sides of a sheet cake with red white and blue and it came out pretty good (sorry no pic). Another option would be to frost with white, then use a flat tip (like for basket weave) to pipe on stripes, let crust, then smooth. Either technique should work Good luck!