How many of you bakers out there have professional schooling in cake decorating and/or baking? I am self-taught but have always been crafty and creative. I am wondering because so many people ask me if I went to some sort of school to learn decorating. If one considers youtube schooling, then yes, I went to school.

I have a degree in art, but never went to cullinary school. I learned baking & the basics of decorating on the job working for a bakery during college. I've always been handy in the kitchen & creative so my cake business is a perfect blend of those.

Business degree but all baking and decorating are self-taught.

Taking a few classes in the Pastry Arts program at the local college. Haven't taken anything cake-specific yet so I can't say how useful it would be to my 'caking.' We'll see. Everything up until this point has been gleaned from self-study and asking LOADS of questions.

Completely self-taught. But I learned by working at a bakery and watching the decorators. Several months after leaving I made a Tiffany box cake for my SIL and the rest is history. I was hooked.

Cake central, blogs and youtube taught. You know, a coworker asked me to give her lessons, I told her about youtube but she said to me, "I want to see someone do the decorating work". Helloooo!!! What is the difference with watching a video. Someone WILL be decorating. Am getting a lot of baking and decorating lessons enquiries. Hubby says I must start and get extra bucks.

i went to school for Fashion Design and Merchandising. All baking and decorating is self taught from books, and a lot of experimenting

I only have a Business degree, and the Internet is my only teacher when it comes to cakes. Have never taken a single Wilton class or the likes, and have never seen anyone IRL decorating in front of me other than on youtube.
The only person I've seen baking (undecorated cakes) IRL was my mother, when I was a kid. She doesn't bake anymore now that I do cakes.

I've never taken a professional class. I've learned everything from CC, youtube, and other various websites. Im on my seventh cake so far and it all started when I just really wanted to do purse cake for my nieces bday. I posted it on fb back in march and since then I have cake orders booked through out the year. Whew! What did I get myself into!? People now constantly tell I need to open my own shop. That is so frightening to me.

Marketing and accounting degrees - - never took a cake decorating class. I mostly saw something I liked and figured out on my own how to do it. Not the easiest way to go about it.

I have a pastry arts certificate and a lot of courses in studio art and costume design. I used to be a department manager at a large store in Boston, so that was my business education!

I have a degree in accounting and also business management. I am self taught. Although, since teaching myself I have worked for 3 different bakeries (about 11 years of my life) and have pick up all kinds of tips along the way. I personally believe that being self taught is the way to go. I know that some of the best decorators we have had in the bakeries have been self taught. The schools around where I live are okay. They don't focus long on decorating though. The biggest culinary school around me only spends 3 weeks on decorating and the rest is pastry. They only learn the decorating really when they do their internship.

I, too, never went to baking/pastry school. I learned from reading cookbooks and making lots of mistakes. Lots and lots and lots of mistakes. I learned the business end after I started my bakery business. Lots of mistakes there, too. I'm totally amazed that I lived to tell about it.

Well, I have a degree in Animal Behaviorism and Equestrian Education and an Associates in Accounting.

In a former life. When I was looking into Equestrian Schools I also received the brochure on Culinary Arts from Johnson & Wales. Baking was my other passion for my entire life. My MALE guidance counselor in high school actually told me that "Chefs are men. Period. And to become a truly great Chef you must have the resources to travel the world and learn the great cuisines." Yup. This was many years before the Celebrity Chef craze and Food Network.

So, since cooking and baking weren't a "real" profession, I went and burned myself out but good in the horse world.

Then, more school, marriage, work and finally went to Culinary School. That is really where I belonged all those years ago, but hey, here I am. My school had baking classes, but not a baking only course, so all my cake decorating is self taught with books (no internet back then girls!! <<GASP>> and blood, sweat and tears. I did go through the Wilton courses long, long ago when fondant was something that only Europeans were playing with.

But....I've been an artist my whole life and cake decorating is just one medium that I work in.

Thanks for all of the replies!

If someone sees a cake I made and asks did I go to school for that? I would say yes, I did go to school to learn how to spell Happy Birthday.

SoFloGuy, that is the best response...

I didn't go to school to learn to do this, but I did go to culinary school to TEACH this. It's amazing where this passion can take you......

I got my MBA years ago, and later went back for the AA in Baking and Pastry Arts. Loved culinary school. Well, I like school in general.

I have a Nutrition degree and a Health Promotion Diploma. So I can tell you exactly how bad my cakes are for you

I've taken some professional cake decorating courses but I really do learn the best when teaching myself

Wish I would have went to school for this, but I have a 2 B.S. degrees one in Early Human Development and the other in Family Science. Just completed my masters in Minority and Urban Education.

I learned all of my decorating skills from here, youtube, and google. I can look at pictures and replicate them very well. I am a very visual/ hand on learner.

Many caker's are self-taught, myself included. Thanks to youtube, CC and in my case google! lol I spend MANY hours online educating myself on everything about Cakes, because I have a passion for it, I believe that you can learn anything as long as you have a passion for it. I worked for a major airline for 10 years and was BORED to death! I've been making cakes for about 3 years now and cant get enough of it! lol

How interesting! What do you teach? ... I didn't go to culinary school either. But I now teach the business of baking at the CIA. [/quote]

I teach advanced pastry arts. We spent three weeks on cakes last semester. I LOVE it!

I have a degee in Business and Marketing. Did a one-month long course in the art of baking and pastry making then did a one-on-one baking course with a teacher and ended up working on cakes with her for 2 years. That is how I learnt in addition to CC, youtube, blogs, etc. Only my mom's older friends and her business clients ask if I went abroad to study in one of those fancy culinary schools. They seem more interested in paper qualifications than my own clientele.

My Mom taught me decorating with butter cream (that's all they used back in the day!), and I'm self taught in fondant. I've been working with fondant now for about 1 1/2 years, and love it!

After making 4 wedding cakes totally slef-taught I took wilton classes - eventually ended up teaching it. Love teaching.....don't like Wilton structer though

I too have a degree in Nutrition. Ok, this will tell a little about my age, I took the Wilton home lessons, read their books, magazines and looked at their videos. I have to admit I've learned so much more from here on CC, youtube, internet websites - bloggers and other books. Long story, short, I'm a visual learner too and self taught.