So I'm making my first tiered cake for an anniversary party (I have a lot of time to learn) and I have a few questions-

1) I love when ribbons are used on the bottom of each tier, but do you typically use real ribbon or make them with fondant?

2) What is the best method to coloring buttercream? Wilton's gel, food coloring or something else?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

when I use ribbon, its usually store bought satin ribbon, around one inch in width, and it has NO wire running through it .. its hard to get it to smooth if there is wire in the ribbon ... there is a cake in my photos with purple ribbon around the base, and I think it looks better then fondant ribbon, jmo, anyways, to color buttercream I really love Americolor. Their colors are so bold and vibrant and it does not take that much to get them that way. Hope that helps!

Yup. cakerator is right. I think real ribbon looks better. If you have buttercream under it and don't want it to grease up your ribbon, cut a piece of wax paper the same width of the ribbon and put it between the cake and the real ribbon. It will act like a barrier and protect the ribbon. HTH

Teresa