NEW! Faux Pumpkin Cake

yes, Deb loves sweets - edible or not!

and since Halloween is all about the treats,

i just make my own calorie-free versions -

like faux caramel apple pumpkins and this faux pumpkin cake.

in trying to finish up my yearly 'pumpkin palooza' projects,

i had an idea for a pumpkin slathered with frosting to look like a cake,

but wasn't sure if i could make it look the way i wanted it to...

after searching online for images of 'pumpkin shaped cakes'

(click here to see what came up). 

i was scrolling Instagram and saw THIS:

but WAIT - that's not a cake. it's EMBROIDERED fabric!

artist Heather Rios is INSANELY talented at making fake look real.

she shares her astounding works of art on Insta at @heather_rios_arte

Heather's idea of showing the inside of the 'cake' 

impacted and changed my original plan -

and made me reach for a particular material in my stash

to approximate the texture she gets in her artwork.

continue reading to see how it all came together!

there are two textures in this project, the cake and the frosting,

and getting them as close to 'real' as i could was one of my goals.

the 'cake' texture is made from remnants of a beach towel,

and the 'frosting' is a thick combination of paint and corn starch

that i used on the exterior of the pumpkin,

while the 'frosting' between 'cake' layers is hot glue painted white.

i really love how it all came out - and i'm sharing my tutorial below.

FYI: this is a LONG tutorial, with multiple phases

and a 'materials' list for each phase. it takes a while!

(tho not as long as it took me to create, photograph, edit, and write this post!)

TUTORIAL

materials part 1:

styrofoam pumpkin . sharp knife . posterboard . scissors

drawing paper . glue stick . hot glue . spray paint

acrylic paint . paintbrushes . corn starch . cupcake papers

CLICK ON EACH IMAGE BELOW TO ENLARGE

TOP ROW:

using a sharp serrated knife, cut a 'slice' out of a styro pumpkin.
(tip: do this INSIDE a box, so the tiny little styro balls don't go everywhere!)

lay the slice on its side on a piece of posterboard, and trace the inner curve.
flip the slice over to its other side, and trace the inner curve.
you'll end up with an oval-ish shape - cut it out with scissors.
fold that paper shape in half and place it onto the slice - 
half on one side, half on the other, to make sure it is the same size.
hot glue that posterboard shape onto the slice, sealing the edges.

BOTTOM ROW:

take a piece of posterboard and fold it in half,
then insert it into the cut part of the pumpkin as shown.
trace the outer edge of the pumpkin onto the posterboard,
then cut that shape out and hot glue it into position on the cut pumpkin.
seal the edges with a thick bead of hot glue.

TOP ROW:

cut a strip of the posterboard (mine is @ 1" wide and 6" long)
and roll it up in your hand. then insert it into the hole in the top of the pumpkin.
(i pull the stubby styro stems off, then cut a hole so i can use other stems)

i used a scrap of posterboard and it wasn't perfectly straight -
which gave it a longer portion that tucked perfectly into the hole.
add some hot glue to hold the stem in place and keep it from unrolling.

place the pumpkin and the slice into a shallow box,
and spray with spray paint to cover EVERY inch of them.

BOTTOM ROW:

once the spray paint has dried, mix up the 'frosting':
i poured some thick white acrylic paint onto a plate,
then mixed in spoonfulls of cornstarch to thicken it up even more.
the result is a mashed-potato consistency.

i used wide soft-bristled brushes to apply this mixture
to the outside edge of the slice and the outside of the pumpkin.
they were left to dry overnight...

.... and the next morning, i saw that they had a 'craquelure' finish.
(great for faking antiques - not so great on a vegetable.)
so i sprayed another thick coat of white spray paint onto the slice and pumpkin.
that filled in the cracks a bit and made it look better.

next, i hot glued a white cupcake paper liner onto the stem,
giving it the vertical lines of a stem and reflecting the cake theme.
(i left it unpainted at this point - but later, covered it in white acrylic paint)

materials part 2:

scissors . drawing paper . glue stick . hot glue 

towel or fuzzy fabric . acrylic paint . paintbrushes

TOP ROW:

starting with the slice, i traced and cut another oval - this time from paper -
as a 'pattern' to help with creating the cake layers.
then i cut the lime green edges from an old beach towel
(i used orange sections of it last year for my beach ball pumpkins!)

BOTTOM ROW:

i laid some strips of toweling over the oval,
leaving space in between them to create the 'frosting' later.
on the slice piece, the middle strip will bend over the edge of the slice.
i adhered the toweling to the paper with a glue stick to hold it in place
as i flipped the paper over and trimmed the strips to fit the oval shape.

TOP ROW:

i folded the paper around the slice to make sure the strips would fit,
then removed the strips from the paper and glued them onto the slice.

BOTTOM ROW:

i followed the same procedure for the cake, and folded the paper in half
to make sure it fit the opening.
but did not remove the strips from the paper - 
i moved on to the next phase.

TOP ROW:

next, i applied a thick bead of hot glue between the strips of toweling
to look like frosting between the cake layers.

i also flipped the pumpkin upside down and filled in the space

under the stem with hot glue, leaving it upside down to dry.

thick white acrylic paint on a flat soft brush covers the glue,
making it look like raised frosting.

once the insert for the pumpkin was dry,
i hot glued the whole paper into place on the pumpkin,
and added a bead of glue around the outer edge to seal it.

then i painted all of the hot glue edges with the white paint.

materials part 3:

clear nail polish or clear glue . cake sprinkles . cake glitter

everything about this cake is fake - except the sprinkles!!!
a few bottles of cake decorating sprinkles from the kitchen
served perfectly for the final detail.
i poured out some of the red-white-green mix
and painstakingly separated the white and green for this project.

to attach them to the pumpkin & slice exterior,
i poured some clear nail polish (cheap, from the dollar store) onto the pumpkin top
 and dusted the green sugar and sprinkles onto the surface.
i pressed lightly on the sprinkles to make sure they would be secure.

to do the slice, i held it in my hand and added sprinkles
in exactly the area that they would appear
if the slice was still part of the cake.

then i painted the cupcake paper stem with white acrylic paint.

(it looked unfinished as just paper)

this is the final cake as i had originally intended it to look.

thanks to the inspiration from Heather Rios' art,
i added the interior details so you could see the 'cake' part,
and ended up with this:

SO much better!!!
i've made a cake and a slice before, for my 60th birthday
but somehow didn't put that together with this project

until i saw Heather's artwork.
(i've linked a bunch of my 'fake cakes' below this post)

______________________________

if you know me and have been around awhile.
you know that copying and theft of creative ideas
is very important to me. it IS my soapbox.
it has happened to me and my artist friends for decades.

so once this project was done, i contacted Heather on IG
and asked her permission to mention her influence on my project
and to use an image of her work in this post.
i sent her the image of her work AND one of my finished cake,
and she very kindly offered her permission - with sweet comment.

i am always inspired by the work of other creative artists.
but i strive to come up with original ideas and ways of creating.

i would not mention or include images of another person's work
without their permission.
and if i were creating products to SELL, i wouldn't use anything
that wasn't my original idea and method.
(if i am building a biz as an artist/creative, i better BE creative enough
to not have to steal ideas, replicate, and sell them. nope.)

Heather's influence on my project made it far better than my original plan,
and sharing that with you - and her - is the only way i work.
_____________________________________

now for a confession:

i don't know if you noticed it, 

but i made a HUGE mistake while creating this: 

the 'cake' and 'frosting' lines do NOT line up

from the pumpkin cake to the cake slice!

they are running in directions that don't go together.

...and i didn't even notice until i was editing images!

ah well. it's good enough!
i'm going to display it in our kitchen for the rest of the fall season.

related content:

beach towel pumpkins

faux cakes 1  2  3  4  5  6

shared online:

funky junk interiors | new upcycle ideas #750

thank you for including my project in your feature, Donna!

my wee abode | tuesday turn about #276

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