I am making my neices wedding cake. It will be my first wedding cake so I am starting to think about it PLENTY EARLY! lol. I live in Maryland. The temperature here the end of June averages from about 70 to 90 degrees. The reception will be held in an Old Mill and it is not airconditioned. I will have to set the cake up early in the morning the day of the wedding. The wedding will be at 2pm, so the reception won't be until late afternoon. I'm wondering if we should even consider fondant, or is that too big of a chance to take? I'd hate to get to the reception and find the fondant melting off the cake. Any of you experienced cake decorators out there have any advice for a wedding cake novice like me?

Hmmmmm...my experience with both fondant and buttercream is that they will stand up to warmer temperatures without "melting" as long as they are not placed in direct sunlight. One mistake my Mother used to make when she still did cakes was that she would freeze her cakes, ice them, fondant them, then let them thaw to room temperature. She had more than one cake disaster because the condensation got trapped between her crumb coat and her final finishing layer of icing/fondant. That caused the BC and fondant to just slide off the cake.

Learning from her mistakes, I make sure that my cakes are room temperature (or just slightly chilled in the fridge...but never frozen) before I put my finishing layer of BC or fondant on. I have delivered and set up many wedding cakes in the dead heat of summer here in CA (this summer maxed out at 112 degrees!!!) but no cake disasters! At most, the sides will seriously deform if you touch them, but if you leave them alone they won't just slide off.

What you could do is keep your cakes in the fridge overnight to chill them, set them up while they are still cool so you won't run the risk of knocking anything off of them, keep your cake out of direct sunlight, as cool as possible, and you should be fine.

There are recipes for "high temperature" buttercream, but I haven't found one that tastes any good...

Good luck!!