Cake Competition Advise Needed.....

Decorating By chelleb1974 Updated 20 Sep 2007 , 3:06pm by chelleb1974

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chelleb1974 Posted 19 Sep 2007 , 1:36pm
post #1 of 7

Hello All!

I have only entered one competition ever...and have a question for all of you that have entered competitions before, or know someone who has.

It is a wedding cake competition, and I want to put pale blue roses on it.....however roses don't naturally grow in blue (at least not that I know of). I am making the roses (gumpaste) and am not sure if I should do them in blue because that will go with the cake, or pick a different flower to make that actually grows in blue. If this were a regular wedding cake for a client, I would just make the blue ones and not worry about it, but this is a competition.

Thanks for all your opinions and advice!

~Chelle

6 replies
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Auryn Posted 19 Sep 2007 , 2:43pm
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Mind you ive never entered a competition yet,
however I would say it depends on the actual competition.
I know that some are very strict regarding vegetation in that it has to be natural and realistic

and I know theres others that they dont care- they just look at technique, look etc

if you can I would call up the competition people and ask them what their rules are on the matter

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chelleb1974 Posted 19 Sep 2007 , 2:45pm
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Thanks Auryn - I was thinking of doing that and figured I'd ask here first!

~Chelle

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leah_s Posted 19 Sep 2007 , 2:53pm
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There is a rose that is referred to as blue but its a pale, pale lavendery-blue. A rose website will likely have a picture.

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chelleb1974 Posted 19 Sep 2007 , 3:03pm
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Thank leahs! I had no idea! I will have to do some searching on the web.

~Chelle

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bkeith Posted 20 Sep 2007 , 3:01pm
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It pretty much depends on the rules and the judges. If the rules don't specifically state that your flowers must be botanically correct, then you should have license to do what makes sense with your design.

That said, I'll say that some judges are sticklers for botanical correctness, regardless of what the rules say.

My judging philosophy is to try to determine intent. If it's obvious that the entrant was going for accuracy and missed (petals too thick, shape wrong, badly applied color, etc.), then I'll ding them for that. If the technique is good, however, I'm willing to allow lots of leeway when it comes to artistic expression. As long as the color is applied well, I don't care too much that it wouldn't actually occur in nature.

Best bet is to contact the contest organizers to get their input.

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chelleb1974 Posted 20 Sep 2007 , 3:06pm
post #7 of 7

Thanks bkeith! The cake is actually going to be for the Mid-Atlantic Cake Show in 2008 - and I have come up with a better (I hope) combination of flowers!

Thank you everyone for all your input!

~Chelle

edited for spelling!

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