I'm looking to try something other than chocolate or traditional white cake to decorate on and I was hoping for some suggestions of recipes for tasty cakes that will still hold up to a couple of decorated layers.

I'm sorry I'm sure this has been discussed before but I couldn't seem to come up with anything in the search. Although I did find some other quite interesting threats to read. LOL

There are hundreds of flavours to choose from! Lemon, chocolate orange, fruit cake, mint choc, choc chip, chocolate fudge...the list goes on.

I know that there's lots of cake recipes out there but I was just wondering how do I know if they  will be a good candidate for decorating with either buttercream or fondant? 

If you use boxed mixes try Betty Crocker butter pecan with this recipe:  http://www.cakecentral.com/recipe/7445/the-original-wasc-cake-recipe   with this icing recipe:  http://www.cakecentral.com/recipe/22469/2-icing

Then there is orange dreamcicle; spice; and lemonade.  They are all good candidates for decorating! 

I have made tres leche cakes before. I made stabilized whip cream frosting from Wilton site with piping gel added to it and was able to pipe with it with no problem. I used wilton gel paste to color it with. Everyone loved it!!!