Couture Cakes

Couture Caker Hend Taha From Hodzi Cakes

Hend Taha 

Hend Taha from Hodzi Cakes

GREY LOGO PNG 

Couture Cakers International Sugar Art Collaboration is hosted by Heba M Elalfy of Sweet Dreams by Heba.  This is the fourth annual celebration of couture using all types of sugar medium as created by an international team of Sugar Artists. The theme this year is Islamic / Hijabi Bridal Dresses.

 

For the next few days I will be interviewing sugar artists who are participating in the collaboration.  

Here is my interview with Hend Taha.

Tell me about yourself. How long have you been decorating? How did you learn to decorate? Do you decorate professionally? Have you taught any cake decorating classes? Have you competed in any competitions?

I am Hend Taha , Egyptian Sugar artist, 31 years old, I am a structural engineer 2010 graduate, from Cairo university faculty of engineering. I began cake decorating as a hobby 6 years ago then I took it as a business from 2015, I loved mostly the modeling part, fondant modeling & sculpting cakes in realistic looks and busts. I didn’t take any cake decorating courses I was self-learner however I took some developing courses like basic sugar flowers & basic figure modeling then I advanced my level in self-learning process till I reached a professional level. I give live courses in Cairo-Egypt like basic cake decorating, cake sculpting bust, modeling figurines & sugar flowers. In August 2017 I won the third place for a sugar flowers bouquet in Al Qaser competition in Egypt. In the same year December 2017 I won the fourth place in “La Cuisine” competition in Cairo-Egypt with a three tier royal cake for Great Britain. In June 2019 I won the first place with cup of excellence in a cake competition in Damietta-Egypt participated with a gravity defying Mother Nature sculpture.

 

What is the name of your business/bakery, where you are located, what area you serve, and what you specialize in.

You can follow my work in the following links ,I specialize in 3d cakes with figurines, sculpted cakes.

Social Media Links

https://www.facebook.com/HodziCakes/
Instagram: @hodzi_cakes

 

 

Hend Taha 1 

Tell me about your design.  

My piece is inspired by a Turkish wedding dresses designer (Asli Kongel), My piece is about Islamic bride on stage holding her veil & roses , three tiered cake, first tier covered with fondant , the second tier is covered with white glittery pearl sugar sheet technique, edible decorations & satinice gumpaste ranunculus roses, I chose very delicate colors of violet degrees and pink in the bride roses , third tier is the bride dress cake and fondant body, covered with fondant and the dress & veil made from edible fabric dusted by pearl glittery color to best resemble the white bridal Islamic dress, I hope you love it <3

 

Hend Taha 2 

All credit for this photograph goes to ‘Asli Kongel’.

Favorite stories about your pieces. 

The first cake I ever decorated was my 27th birthday cake it was very simple with roses cut by plunger cutters &my name on it, I was really very happy with my very first cake creation 😀
I decided with my mom to begin to take it as a business in 2015 , as my mom is always my supporter & always inspire me ,I named the page very close to her name ( Hoda)my page ( Hodzi Cakes).
I have a story of my first wedding cake , it was a five tier wedding cake with hundreds of small roses, I still remember how beautiful it turned out , I also remember that all my family helped me in veining the roses it was a big week working on it & delivering to the hotel & the happiest moment when I saw the wedding photo of the bride & groom with the cake they were extremely happy ☺

 

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Do you have a favorite Disney movie? Do you have a favorite Disney character? What is your favorite thing to watch on Disney+? Have you been to any of the Disney parks? Do you have a favorite ride? Do you have a favorite story about a trip or experience at one of the Disney parks?

Cindrella
Daisy Duck

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Do you have a favorite cartoon series or character? What was your favorite cartoon to watch when you were little? Would you prefer live in Bedrock with the Flintstones or in the future with the Jetsons?

Tom &jerry 😀

When I was little & till now as a grown up 😀

Couture Caker Tasnuta Alam From Cake Topperz

Tasnuta Alam 

Tasnuta Alam from Cake Topperz

 

Couture Cakers International Sugar Art Collaboration is hosted by Heba M Elalfy of Sweet Dreams by Heba.  This is the fourth annual celebration of couture using all types of sugar medium as created by an international team of Sugar Artists. The theme this year is Islamic / Hijabi Bridal Dresses.

 

For the next few days I will be interviewing sugar artists who are participating in the collaboration.  

Here is my interview with Tasnuta Alam.

Tell me about yourself. How long have you been decorating? How did you learn to decorate? Do you decorate professionally? Have you taught any cake decorating classes? Have you competed in any competitions?

My name is Tasnuta Alam, graduate Accountant. I am also a British qualified cake Instructor and Judged so far two internationally online contest. I live in Aberdeen, Scotland, UK with my husband and 7 years old boy. But i born and brought up in Bangladesh, i spend most of my life in Bangladesh. From my childhood i used to work my Mom’s helping hand and I enjoyed this fun time a lot. My most favourite part was beating egg foam and whisked cream. 

As my result was first class 1st in my graduation, my only dream was to be a Chartered Accountant. I never thought baking and cake decorating one day will be my proffession. Then i got married and came to the UK. In 2006 without anyones help I made a birthday cake for my Husband’s birthday for the first time. But i failed first two times and third time, i made it which was a perfect cake.That’s how my baking unprofessional journey started. After few months I joined in a full time job and with that, day by day people come to know about my baking and recieved lots of complements from all my friends and family and neighbours. My surroundings people are appriciated me a lot. Futher more in 2013 I had participated in a cake baking and decorating competition in my City Aberdeen, and i had achieved the first prize. And just after that in 2013 I have started officially a business and i named it Cake Topperz. 

From the beginning i tried all the baking recipes from my Mom’s collections, you tube, cake blogs and cake magazines. Then i joined in lots of baking and cake decorating courses. In 2017 in London, UK, i have completed Masters of Cake Decorating from PME.

Now I teach in all areas of baking and cake decorating online and offline. So far I have achieved 2 first prizes in locally cake contest, 2 gold in online cake contest, 2 gold and 2 silver from Cake International at Birmingham and London. Also recieved  one gold with trophy(Best in Class) from British Sugarcraft Guild. In past three years i have participated in many cake collaborations around the world.This is my third years with Couture Cakers and this collaboration is one of my favourite. Now I ran my own collaborations and this year we arranged an Internationally online cake contest.  

 

What is the name of your business/bakery, where you are located, what area you serve, and what you specialize in.

My page name is Cake Topperz and it located in Aberdeen, Scotland, UK. Most of the time i served in Aberdeenshire but occasionally in a period of time we serve  long distances. 
 

Social Media Links
My instagram Link http://www.intagram.com/tasnuta
And my facebook page link https://m.facebook.com/caketopperz/

 

Tasnuta Alam 1 

Tell me about your design.  

In this collaboration my piece was inspired by a beautiful with eye-catching colours muslim bridal dress. Specifically the colour is my favourite and dress designs and sequences attracted me. How i planned for this beautiful bridal dress i couldn’t manage to complete the design due to shortage of decorating ingredients. I have done all over the cake royal icing hand piping and i followed the design sequence mave colour flowers. For these flowers i used wafer paper and i didn’t use any wafer cutter for that. All the flowers hand cut by exacto knife. Also the shiny bit middle of the flowers i used isomalt diamond. 

I had to escape few detailing from my design which made me sad. Because i really loved the head dressed. Another part was the photography time i had no day lights for 2 days. With all difficulties i hope i have done justice with the bridal dress. I hope you all like my work.

Tasnuta Alam 2 

What Do you do when you are not caking?  

Without caking i try to give my full time to my family. Because caking kept me busy most of the time. I divided my family time and involved with it few fun things. Because my husband he loves my cooking, so i attatched with that Foodography. So this family time become more entertaining for me. I also spend a quality time with my boy. We make scientific project together and very often we go for a tour and do photography. I have a small garden where i planted different flowers and vegetables. 

 

When and why did you decide that you wanted to create a business/hobby?

During my maternity, i was coping good with my baby and at the same time i was missing my job and all my colleagues. One day a friend of mine, she forced me to participate in a local cake contest and unbelievably i had achieved the first prize. From there so many ppl came to me, they said we want to try your cake, please take order. Which motivated me snd and i started my page Cake Topperz in 2013.

 

Favorite stories about your pieces. 

I have few stories with cake related. But i still remember one of them which was very funny. I made a collaboration cake few years ago, which was a real cake and it was for a friends and family party. In this party people were hard to believe that was an edible cake. Then kids started eating biscuits, flowers from the cake which were a great fun.

 

Do you have a favorite story about a disaster?

Disasters gives us a lesson and also an experience. We all learn from it and move on. I have few. I am mentioning here one, it was a 1st birthday cake for my clients baby. We dropped off the cake and set up there. They had not provide us the main venue’s address. It was a tall 3 tier cake. They had  relocated the cake and made a disaster during travelling time. So the cake broken before it reached to the main venue. After that we had long conversation. This story made me more stong regarding order receiving process, and gained good experience.

 

If one of the famous cake decorators offered to make you your dream cake, what would you ask for?

I would definitely ask to them to make for me a frozen Elsa castle cake.

 

Do you have a favorite superhero? What is your favorite superhero movie? If you read comics, what is your favorite comic or run on a comic? If you could be any superhero, who would you want to be? If you could have one super power, what would it be?

My favourite superhero is Spider man, which is my boy’s choice. Because I watch all his favourite movies and cartoon with him last 7 years. I like him because he solved all problem, rescue people from difficult situation. I used to ready few comics which are Tintin, Sipmson and marvel. If i could be a super here then i will choice spiderman.
 

 

Couture Caker Evangelia Korontini From Sweet Madness Cakes

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Evangelia Korontini from Sweet Madness Cakes

GREY LOGO PNG 

Couture Cakers International Sugar Art Collaboration is hosted by Heba M Elalfy of Sweet Dreams by Heba.  This is the fourth annual celebration of couture using all types of sugar medium as created by an international team of Sugar Artists. The theme this year is Islamic / Hijabi Bridal Dresses.

For the next few days I will be interviewing sugar artists who are participating in the collaboration.  

Here is my interview with Evangelia Korontini.

Tell me about yourself. How long have you been decorating? How did you learn to decorate? Do you decorate professionally? Have you taught any cake decorating classes? Have you competed in any competitions?

Hi my name is Evangelia Korontini and I am from Greece
I worked in the sales department of large companies.
Before 11 years I had a very bad accident,for 4 years I was constantly in bed, I have done 9 surgeries until now, but the most important thing is that I can walk normally and fast as before.
I discovered the world of cakes design from the internet.
My first teacher Samantha show me the basis and I start to watching all these great artists from all over the world
I have been baking and decorating cakes and cookies the past 6 years for friends and relatives.
I love every cake to be different and what I do comes out of my soul, passes through my heart and reaches my hands.
I like to challenge myself and try to learn new techniques and new trends.
My first collaboration was with Heba in 2018 and because of that I made my page: Sweet Madness. www.facebook.com/Sweetmadnesscakes.
  

What is the name of your business/bakery, where you are located, what area you serve, and what you specialize in.

Sweet Madness 

Social Media Links
www.facebook.com/Sweetmadnesscakes

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Tell me about your design.  

My piece for Couture Cakers International Collaboration was inspired by a gorgeous white and gold Islamic wedding dress I found on the internet.
I decided to try to make the bride wear the dress and be a real Cake.

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What was your first Cake?

My first cake was for my niece Ophelia, her happiness and smile was the greatest gift for me.

Favorite stories about your pieces. 

Last summer a friend asked me for helping find someone to make a wedding cake to Spetses( Greek Island).
When I saw the design I said I will do it.
It was a big risk for me had so much stress,and was so scared.
But in the end I did it and in fact the "Cuisine Supreme" put it on their page.

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If one of the famous cake decorators offered to make you your dream cake, what would you ask for?

Let him or her to surprise me

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Do you have a favorite story about a disaster?

It was a nightmare,we made a surprise baby shower for a girlfriend,a big stork that gives the baby.
The road to the party was all round and irregular and until we reached there the stork from standing position was found sitting.

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Do you have a favorite Disney movie? Do you have a favorite Disney character? What is your favorite thing to watch on Disney+? Have you been to any of the Disney parks? Do you have a favorite ride? Do you have a favorite story about a trip or experience at one of the Disney parks?

Love Disney and the most of the movies.

Do you have a favorite superhero? What is your favorite superhero movie? If you read comics, what is your favorite comic or run on a comic? If you could be any superhero, who would you want to be? If you could have one super power, what would it be?

I like to be Superwoman to help people and mostly children.
 

Do you have a favorite cartoon series or character? What was your favorite cartoon to watch when you were little? Would you prefer live in Bedrock with the Flintstones or in the future with the Jetsons?

My favorite cartoon is Bugs bunny. I love the Flintstones and all that they have in Bedrock.

Couture Caker Elisabete Caseiro From Bety Sugarland

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Elisabete Caseiro from Bety’Sugarland – Cake Design by Elisabete Caseiro

GREY LOGO PNG 

Couture Cakers International Sugar Art Collaboration is hosted by Heba M Elalfy of Sweet Dreams by Heba.  This is the fourth annual celebration of couture using all types of sugar medium as created by an international team of Sugar Artists. The theme this year is Islamic / Hijabi Bridal Dresses.

For the next few days I will be interviewing sugar artists who are participating in the collaboration.  

Here is my interview with Elisabete Caseiro.

Tell me about yourself. How long have you been decorating? How did you learn to decorate? Do you decorate professionally? Have you taught any cake decorating classes? Have you competed in any competitions?

I'm Elisabete Caseiro from Lisbon, Portugal. I studied Chemical Engineering and used to be a Chemistry and Physics teacher.
Some years ago, I started making my kids cakes and fell in love with cake decoration. Now I’m a full-time cake decorator.
I love to model and paint on cakes. But what I most love is to create sculpted and gravity defying cakes and look at people’s faces when they see them and ask if they are really cakes.
I offer presential cake decorating and gelatin courses. I teach in my studio, in Lisbon, but have also teach in other areas, in Portugal and abroad. I was an instructor at Academia Profissional de Cake Design for several years.
I love challenges and I entered several shows and competitions both national and international, having won some important prizes, from which several gold awards at Cake International, England.
 

What is the name of your business/bakery, where you are located, what area you serve, and what you specialize in.

Currently, I have my own cake studio, “Bety’Sugarland – Cake Design by Elisabete Caseiro”, in Lisbon.
I have been invited for several TV shows. I also have been published in several Portuguese and international Cake Art Magazines and I’m co-author of the book “O Admirável Mundo do Cake Design”.
I make about everything in cake decorating but what I most like is definitely to make cake that don’t look like cakes. I love to sculpt cakes and watch them become something else. And if they defy gravity or have any kind of special effect even better.
Also love to make cupcakes, cookies, decorated gelatins… everything to create a magical themed table of sweets.
 

Social Media Links

Web: www.betysugarland.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/BetySugarland/

Blog: http://betycat.blogspot.pt/

Pinterest:https://pt.pinterest.com/betycat/bety-sugarland-cake-design-by-elisabete-caseiro/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/betysugarland/?hl=pt

Cakes Decor: http://cakesdecor.com/BetySugarland

 

ElisabeteCaseiro Bety Sugarland CakeDesignbyElisabeteCaseiro 

Tell me about your design.  

I don’t usually do many wedding cakes, so they are always a challenge for me and the Couture Cakers collaboration was a great opportunity to create something different from my usual work.
Islamic bridal dresses are so beautiful that, when I started searching, I immediately designed several cakes using some of those dresses as inspiration. Hope I have the chance to make them someday.
I used this particular dress as inspiration because I fell in love with its colours.

Elisabete Caseiro 

I found the picture in the site https://stylespk.com/best-kebaya-dress-design . Unfortunately I couldn’t find out the name of the creator nor the photographer.
The cake is all covered with sugarpaste. I used homemade sugar lace for the first and top tiers and Diamond Gel for the crystals in the middle tier and board.

Tell me about the first cake you decorated.

My very first cake was for my youngest son first birthday, 15 years ago. It was not only the first cake I decorated, but also the first time I baked a cake, so you can imagine the adventure it was. 😊 I had find by chance the Debbie Brown’s book “Fifty Party Cakes” and thought: Why not? There was a cake there that was a wool ball with a cat and, as I love cats, I thought I could give it a chance and represent my own two cats. So I, had never baked before and had to make a ball cake… Easy peasy!
Those days, there were no cake decorating shops so it wasn’t easy to find the sugarpaste. After lots of research I found it in a pastry supplier, but I had to buy 5 kg of white sugarpaste! As for the colorants, I just used the liquid ones that I found in the supermarket. Huge mistake! I struggled with the paste and the colorant as it got stucked to my hands and surfaces, and needed to add tons of icing sugar to it. Using one of my sons plasticine extruder (conveniently sanitized) I managed to pull the (never ending) strands of sugar to cover the ball. Than I had to model the two cats which revealed to be the easiest part. 😊
In conclusion, there was what I thought at the time a not to repeat experience and if I had not 4kg left of sugarpaste I would probably have never decorated a cake again. LOL The good part was that it was a nice surprise at the party and everyone loved the cake!
 

When and why did you decide that you wanted to create a business/hobby?

After the struggle that was my first cake, I did another one for my other son’s birthday, a Nemo this time, just to get read of the paste which went much better this time. Even though I decided not to do more cakes and only two years after, finding difficult to buy the sculpted cakes that I wanted, I thought I could give it a new chance and again made my sons birthday cakes, both for school and for the party. That was when people started to ask me why didn’t I accept orders. It was unthinkable for me at that time but the fact is that I eventually fell in love with cake decorating and our home birthdays were not enough for me to try everything I wanted. Soon I received my first order and had never stopped after that.

Favorite stories about your pieces. 

I don’t like to make simple cakes. Sometimes I have to, but most of the times, when someone asks for a simple cake, I just say that I don’t do it and refer to some friend who does it. I always like to complicate.
One of my challenging cakes was a Slugterra cake where I had freedom to make anything I wanted. I could have done a round cake with the hero and some decoration and it would have been just fine. But I wanted to make things difficult and made a huge, 80 cm long, mechanical dog standing on just one leg. It really caused a great impression.
Some of my favorites were a standing robot with lights and sound that presented himself and sang Happy Birthday in robotic voice, a floating Millenium Falcon with lights and a How to Train your Dragon cake spitting iced fire. And then, there are the animals. I really love animals and have made a few out of cake.

Do you have a favorite story about a disaster?

A disaster is never a good thing, right? I had a couple of them…
For my eldest son 14th birthday I made huge, awesome, gravity defying dragon cake where I used modeling chocolate for the first time. Everything was fine if it wasn’t the fact that the party was in a waterpark in an extremely hot day. I kept the cake in the box, protected from the sun but, when the time came to cut the cake most of the modelling chocolate had melted, so, no legs and arms for this dragon… Fortunately it still had wings and the had was mostly intact so you could still tell it was a dragon, but one that had just came out of a war that it didn’t win…

If one of the famous cake decorators offered to make you your dream cake, what would you ask for?

I really don’t know. In fact, I’ve never had a really birthday cake on my own birthday since I was a little girl, as I usually am on holidays and, when I’m not, I rather spend my day with my family rather than making cakes. But I do love animals so, I guess I’d be happy with any animal cake. Or maybe something with beautiful sugar flowers (tulips, poppies…) as flowers are something that I love to see in nature and take pictures but never had much luck taking care of them and certainly don’t have any patience to make them.

Who is your favorite Harry Potter character? If you went to Hogwarts, which house would you want to be sorted into? Which house would you actual be sorted into? If you were a teacher at Hogwarts, what class would you want to teach? What would your Patronus be?

My favourite Harry Potter character, other than Harry Potter himself, is Hermione because she is always wise and bright. I guess I would be a Gryffindor. I would teach “Care of Magical Creatures” or maybe “Flying” (Fun fact – When I was young I used to had a recurrent dream where I could fly and it was so often and so real that I started to have doubts if I it wasn’t true and I could really fly… Ah Ah! But, sadly, it never happened though…
  

Do you have a favorite Disney movie? Do you have a favorite Disney character? What is your favorite thing to watch on Disney+? Have you been to any of the Disney parks? Do you have a favorite ride? Do you have a favorite story about a trip or experience at one of the Disney parks?

I love everything that is Disney related. I went to Disney World for the first time when I was 31 and felt like I was 5! I was there alone with my little boy who had just made 1 year old, and started his first steps, and I was pregnant of my second, so most of the attractions were forbidden, but that really didn’t matter. I was enchanted by all that magic that surrounds us from the very first step in. From the characters that are everywhere, the shows, the parades to the overall atmosphere everything looked magical to me!
Later, I had the opportunity to participate in a Cake Show to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Disneyland Paris. Can you imagine my joy? I wanted to put everything on that cake and ended up with a two meters tall cake, with lights and motion.
  

Do you have a favorite superhero? What is your favorite superhero movie? If you read comics, what is your favorite comic or run on a comic? If you could be any superhero, who would you want to be? If you could have one super power, what would it be?

I don’ really have a favorite superhero, though when I was a kid, I loved to read all the comics that I put my hands on to. But I usually see the Spiderman’s and Superman’s movies with my oldest son and we currently are following the DC series Arrow, Flash and Legends of Tomorrow. I have never made one of this series characters cake though, but they are surely in my list.