I had a customer request this cake for a 50th anniversary party this weekend. They would like it to be butter cream not fondant so my question is how do I make the frosting 2 different colors it is hard to see but there is a thin strip of cream icing below the white icing and I am not sure how to do that and keep my lines straight and clean.  Also I am trying to figure out how to do the gold ribbon on the two layers with the birds I think it is done with gum paste but how would you do that without the gum paste stretching and breaking as you put it on there?  Thanks for looking!

Sarah

It's not a real clear picture ...but I would ice the cake in butter cream, then cut the strips out of fondant.    I would never do this cake with the strips being in fondant.    It is just too hard to do neatly out of butter cream.   99.9% of my cakes are butter cream, however, if there is a fondant accent that I must do to achieve the final result...then they must get "some" fondant or I will not do the cake.   I will not set my self up for failure when they don't know how to accomplish the task.  

As far as the gold ribbon...I would use my extruder with fondant.  Don't use gumpaste....just fondant that has a lot of Crisco worked in it....it makes it soft/stretchy.

For the gold accents, you could try piping royal icing and then painting gold once it has set. I have done that for cookies.

Thanks!  I wonder about just using real gold ribbon instead of edible.  Also I wonder about using wax paper on chilled frosting kind of as a stencil at the bottom.  Has anyone ever tried that before?  I feel like I saw it in a Wilton mag a few years ago.
 

Real gold ribbon would definitely work.  Like gold rope.   I don't understand what you would do with the wax paper?  Trust me....if you cut 1" strips of fondant...you will not lose your mind, hair or religion.    LOL

For the cream or khaki colored stripe at the bottom of the cakes, first coat your white BC around the cake as you usually would but leave a 2-3 inch space at the bottom. Then, take your wilton #12 tip and pipe two rows all the way around the cake of the other color (that cream or khaki).  Using your offset spatula, smooth down the cake.  Try not to do too many passes as the two colors will start to blend together.  I hope this helps you!  Here is an example of a cake I did with SMB:  

PS, doing the method I suggested is waaaay easier than trying to put a strip of fondant on the cake and making sure it is all straight.  Plus, it would stick out and I don't think that would look as pretty. 

Thanks!  You all have such good ideas!  I asked at the right place ;)