Hi all you very talented people out there.

I've been lurking for a very long time now  this is my very first post... I am not a professional but love making the occasional cake for a friends birthday etc I don't often get to do them because it can be expensive and I don't sell cakes... but I enjoy it and have fun...

Anyway my question is: I am going to attempt this gargoyle for my friends birthday as she loves them but I'm afraid of the wings as they are quit big and I have not a clue as to how I can get such heavy set wings to stay in place and secure. I was thinking rice crispies to keep it light any other suggestions would be most welcome.. Also what sort of wire would I get to try shape the wings?

Apologies in advance if this question has come up before.. like I said it's just a hobby I love and this is only my third fondant cake  and I have only done a few basic buttercream bears in the past...  Have mucked around and done some fun cupcakes recently too...

What sort of size cake are you thinking? smaller will be easier :-) I would suggest maybe going with a design that has smaller wings perhaps... there are 'cute' gargoyles which are quite cartoony that would be more doable with big eyes and wee wings that you could do with just a wee curl of fondant... bigger wings will need internal support like dowels which may need to be screwed into you base to stop them falling over and pulling the cake to bits :-( Hopefully I can help some more later when I'm at a pc that can post pictures! (Groan) :-)

Ahttps://picasaweb.google.com/116496468995578468770/DropBox?authkey=Gv1sRgCPHTqO2qm9ibSg#5903738465017784978

Hopefully that works and helps! This is the only way i can post an image for some reason :-(

Hey Crazy sorry for the late reply and thank you so much for suggestions. Here is a picture I found in google images that I fell in love with 

I think I'm just going to put two supports in the cake board for the wings and run it behind the main cake(gargoyle body) and blend them in with fondant..Hopefully this works.. It will be fun, I hope.. Never done anything like this so I'm really excited.. My gargoyle has to be at least 3 tiers high? (3 cakes high, I think) sorry not up with the cake terms lol 

Oh my goodness Crazy-Gray I just looked at your pictures of cakes you have made, you are so talented. They are absolutely awesome....

Aw thanks :) .....I soooo wanna do a gargoyle now though!! lol

I'd recommend 3 tiers absolutely, and a strong filling like traditional buttercream or Ganache, if you carve a rough shape into your cake after stacking (don't forget internal supports) you can then do a thick coat, maybe even two coats of ganache which when set you can quite delicately carve/scrape away wih a sharp knife and that will give you a great base to put your fondant over.

Modelling chocolate would be better than fondant for this as you can smooth joins and nobody would ever know letting you gradially build up a perfect face (check out Wicked goodies for recipes and tips she's great!)... if using fondant you'll probably need to mix some of your fondant with water to make a paste and use it for hiding joins, a flat clay tool is brilliant for this. You'll need to set it at least over night for that wet paste to dry then rub powdered sugar over it to remove the shininess :)

Can't wait to see it! best of luck and any qs just ask/PM me :)

To keep them as light as possible wouldn't even use RKT. I would build the frame ad cover it in fondant with tylose on both sides of the frame material and let it dry for a couple of days. If they are going to be big you can put chicken wire on the frame first to give it a little more support and it will add a "scaley" texture to the wing. I want to do a fire breathing dragon

Crazy-Gray you should definitely do a gargoyle cake, I would love to see that :) I think it would be wonderful, of course.... I love the fact that even if mine doesn't, which it more than likely won't come out looking anything like the pic I posted, ppl should still be able to tell what it is. Gargoyles all seem to be unique looking which is a bonus..

BatterUpCake, love your idea on the fondant/tylose over the chicken wire...thank you so much for sharing :)

I won't be tempting this cake for another week and a half so I'm just really trying to get a head start with some ideas of where I'm going to start.. Thanks to you guys I have that somewhere to start 

Exactly what BatterUpCake said!!

I recently made wings for a dove in flight, sort of.  I'll try to post a photo.  I used wire for the internal structure and just made the shape I wanted the wings to be.  I left about 1.5 inches of wire hanging out the bottom of the wing so I could insert it into the gum paste.  I used gum paste to cover the wire and after it dried I added more gum paste for decoration.  I used the wire and gum paste because I wanted the wings to be light and able to be suspended up above the back of the dove.  I'll post a pic.  

http://cakecentral.com/g/i/3064122/a/3381889/suspended-wings-on-dove-using-wire/sort/display_order/

Geez, I'm not even sure how to post a photo directly to this thread.  Hope this helps!!

Knlcox thank you for posting the dove pic. They look lovely :) such a great job you did, they look so real  and yes it has also helped, a lot.. 

Once again everyone thank you for all your suggestions it's been so great. I feel a bit more confident now :) well confident with how I'm going to attempt it anyways lol I'm so glad I got up the courage and posted my question on here now, very happy :)

I just want to say thank you to Crazy-Gray, BatterUpCake and Knlcox for your advice it was very much appreciated.

Like I said I'm not a pro I just enjoy making cakes from time to time but in saying that I was quit chuffed with myself. It was really fun.

AOh wow! great job :-) It's really cute :-)

Did you go for a big dowel right down into the cake board?

Really glad you had fun - what's next! he he :-)

Thanks Crazy-Gray :) I just used one long dowel that connected the head to the body and for the wings I used two wood rods with a strong wire wrapped around than shaped in a 1/4 moon shape, than chicken wired, foiled and fondant lol note to self foil reacted with grey fondant and started to go a shade of green so if I ever do that again I will also glad wrap it :)) two holes were drilled into the cake board and a small piece of wood was superglued the bottom of the cake board for extra support  so the wood rods were placed into them. There were of course 3 other small pieces of wood placed underneath the cake board so we had an even sitting board... The wings ended up being a bit tall for the cake so had to cut and drill out to make them smaller... This was a bit unsettling as the cake was already on when discovered eek.... but got through it all in the end :) oh and it tasted good, choc mud with dark choc ganache, head was RKT with fondant....

Next up, my son's birthday is coming up and he has requested Debbie Brown's Tom and Jerry cake, um looking forward to the challenge but I'm very nervous as he is having a birthday party and people will see my cake haha I have only done my cakes for very close friends so judgement naturally has always been positive :P

AThose wings are fantastic! Great job!

Awe thank you knlcox, it was a fun project 

Beautiful job! He could easily be perched on an upper corner of a great cathedral!

Jan

Thank you everyone for being so supportive  it's a nice change these days