Hi,
I'm new to your forum, was "just looking" until now 
.
I have an order for 50th Birthday Cake with a big Lattice Swan with red rose on the back. The lady who ordered it, used to be cake decorator herself. I'm not professional cake decorator, but completed cake decorating course last year and sold this same lady one cake from the course project. Her family absolutely loved it. Anyway, to cut the long story short, I'm trying to find some clues on how to go about making this 3D swan. Tried on internet, haven't found anything so far. Searched here and didn't get any results either. If there was a topic, please send me on. Any ideas will be greatly appreciated!
Here is the cake I sold her. Happy 18th Birthday was added afterwards.
( please let me know if I did anything wrong with the picture posting, thanks a lot)
I love the details you have on this cake. It looks wonderful! Sorry that I can't help with the swan!
might you use a variation of a technique I saw on the Christmas Cake challenge on Food Network??
get a ballon..blow it up as big as you want the body. Pipe lines in patterns HALF way around it to form the basic body and tail.
Let dry and then gently deflate balloon....biggest trick will be holding balloon level. Only thing I can think of is burying it half way is some powder in a big box
Wings would be piped separately and then attached.
I'd do head and neck "flat" and not try for a rounded effect.
I started a course last year where we had to put a swan on our cake. I have the swan half made at home, but never finished the course b/c the teacher frustrated me to death. Anyhow, the swan was made using gumpaste and a chocolate mould. You should be able to get a swan mould wherever they sell chocolate moulds. If i am able to find one on the internet i will send you a link. You basically make it similar to how you'd make a chocolate. You roll out some paste,and then press it into a well dusted mould, it has to be well dusted and your edges have to be very clean and sharp as you will let both sides of the swan dry in the mould. Once both sides are dry you stick both sides with royal icing, let it dry and you sand it down using a small emery board or similar to remove any rough edges.
I hope this has been of help to you.
Here are some links that may help you
http://www.fbnr.com/Recipes/075/0897001075.htm
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/candymolds/M-animals/90-11943.jpg
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/candymolds/M-animals/H-864.jpg
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/candymolds/M-animals/M-animals.htm
Nati
PS Your cake is fantastic!!!
Here I found a tutorial from a former member of CC.. Cali4dawn.. Her tutorial is for a stork.. here I show a picture (step3) from her tutorial edited to show you how to begin to pipe a swan.. Hope this helps..
click below for the entire view of Dawns tutorial..
http://community.webshots.com/album/276920554aKXZbm
I do have a pattern for a 3D swan but will have to scan it into the computer tomorrow morning. It was used for the top of a wedding cake and can put up that pic too if you want.
Yes, I would love to! Thanks a lot!
Thank you every one for kind words to my cake and helpful ideas and links! I loved the chocolate swan. Do not know if anyone has similar molds here. Few decorating shops I know do not stock fancy things. Would be nice to make it from white chocolate, but then it is not that white down here and it may be quite hot even late spring. This year the weather do not stop surprising.
Nati, Sorry to hear your teacher was not very good. Your cakes are magnificent nevertheless! I can't complain, our teacher was very professional and very clear with all the explanations.
Here are another couple of samples of our course projects. All 3 cakes were made for Christmas. I gave them all for Xmas presents. Inside traditional fruit cakes.
Yanak , your cakes are beautiful ....very nicely done 
very flawless and elegant.... 
http://www.fbnr.com/Recipes/075/0897001075.htm
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/candymolds/M-animals/90-11943.jpg
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/candymolds/M-animals/H-864.jpg
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/candymolds/M-animals/M-animals.htm
Nati
PS Your cake is fantastic!!!
There is also this one:
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/gumpaste/CC250.jpg
sorry the pic isn't the greatest and if you want I will go out and have someone scan the book for me. The camera didn't take a great pic but thought I could give you an idea as to what it was.
Thanks a lot for the effort, Cashley! I got the idea I thing I saw it in a book once before. It looks very familier. Thanks once again!
I love your string work. I haven't figured out the right pressure for it yet, mine just fall apart! Yours are incrediable!
It is not about the pressure, it is about icing consistancy. The icing must go in uninterrupted line as far as you can sqweeze it in one go and it should not take mush effort to sqweeze it. Try on a board first. I spent hours doing 1/3 of the cake and did the rest in about 2 hours with fresh icing. But ... I sworn it would be the last string work, it may be soooo frustrating ...
Thanks for the link! That picture is fantastic! I think it is just what I need. Now I need to figure out how to make it non-flat.
luvfondant
Thanks for the compliment!
Hello People!
Thank you all once again for suggestions and support. I made the swan. I'm very pleased how it turned out. The customer is very happy too. It was fun making it and much simpler than I thought.
Here it is. Sorry for the quality of the pictures, my camera is not very good.
Yanak, your cakes are beautiful...can't wait to see the swan when you are finished with it - please post when you are done.
Yanak....can you tell me what fondant you use if you don't mind. It has a wonderful almost translucent look to it and where you added the fondant ruffle is amazing, how did you get it to be such a smooth transition or is it done before laying on the cake? Your pastel colours are amazing, what food colouring do you use? Sorry for all the questions but your cakes are just beautiful. I am very new to this world of decorating so please forgive all my questions
Thank you, ladies!
Samsgranny, it is actually finished ..., on the third picture is the whole cake, just picture quality is far from perfect.
dlp,
What details about that swan would you like to know?
Taigen,
I have answered your question in the separate topic you opened, please feel free to ask if anything is not clear.
KHalstead,
Yes, I will upload the pictures into gallery, need to work with them a bit first .
The funny thing was that the customer did not cut the cake. She said she didn't have it long enough to part. To tell you the truth, I was glad. I hated the idea that it will be destroyed. The toper is separate and they will get it off eventually, but still ... That was the first cake I made that I felt sorry to give away ...
absolutely one of the most beautiful cakes i have ever seen. I know what you mean about cutting the cake. After iI put my heart & soul into something beautiful, I can't hardly stand to look at it being dug into .
you might have already gone over this......if you did sorry.... i'm assuming you made the body out of fondant and that you painted on the eyes and beak.....and the wings.....how did you do them? it almost looks like you did it over some netting......
you are very talented!!! thanks for being so willing to share! I have collected swans for years.....so i would love to be able to make one of these next time i make a cake....it might be more of a struggle for me though..because i am not artistic at all........but you said it was easy...... so i'm anxious to try!!! Donna 
WOW! you do fantastic work - I'm anticipating more pics!
i'm assuming you made the body out of fondant and that you painted on the eyes and beak.....and the wings.....how did you do them? it almost looks like you did it over some netting......
The idea was to have the whole swan made of royal icing, but I could not figure out how to do it. Then I thought I would make the neck solid from fondant and the body lattice, but how would you attach solid neck to the lace body???!!! So, I made the whole thing solid, proper neck with thinish body, dried it for few days and then built up lattice back, about 5 layers, drying every layer for few hours.
For the wings, I took tulle, cut out the shape of wings, dipped it into sugar syrup to stiffen, dryed it on rolled tea towel to make the shape as close as possible to the swan body, put the pattern under the tulle and piped over with 00 nozel royal icing, allowed it to dry and attached to the body. The swan was already sitting on the board, otherwise, the whole construction would collupse on me .
KrisD13,
Thank you for the template! I thought it looked familier. I have the book at home , silly me, I looked through so many books lately.
Ladies, THANK YOU for the praise! It inspires a lot!
I have uploaded some pictures, thank you very much for interest!
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