When I first starting baking and decorating cakes I was always amazed at Topsy Turvy Cakes. There was a mystery about them and I could never quite figure out what technique they used to make them stable enough. To tell the truth, one of my worst cake experiences was when I tried to make my niece her first birthday cake and attempted this style of cake for the first time, but unfortunately everything went wrong. I sadly ended up taking the top two tiers off and just presenting the bottom tier…definitely not one of my finer moments in my cake career. But thankfully those days are in the past and now the fears and anxiety of making topsy turvy cakes is over. Since I had always found myself scouring the internet to get helpful hints about these styles of cakes and never found a tutorial that I loved I thought I would post one for all of you, so that you didn’t have to go through the same trouble I did. I hope that you find this tutorial helpful and get the courage up to try one of these cakes too!
I don’t remember exactly, but I think my tiers were 5″, 7″, and 9″. Each cake tier has three layers of cake and two layers of filling. This particular cake was coconut buttermilk cake with lemon cream and coconut cream cheese frosting. Once you fill and stack your cake you need to cut the top layer of the cake at an angle and then flip it over to create the sharp curve at the top of the cake. To get those layers to stick together add a little filling and frosting to them to adhere. Always use a serrated knife when cutting your cakes and make sure they are thoroughly chilled too.
Also always make sure and pipe a buttercream dam around the edge of each cake layer when assembling so that the filling doesn’t squish out onto the outside of the cake. This also helps with the stability of the cake. I also trimmed the sides of the cake slightly to help with the topsy turvy look, but make sure and don’t carve away too much at the bottom as it can make the cake not as stable. Once your cake is filled, you can either wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate it or you can keep working and frost the entire cake before letting it rest.
Once frosted you need to refrigerate the cake until the frosting is hard. Then take a piece of parchment paper and trace the size of the next tier that while be sitting on top of it. Cut out the circle and place it on the center of the cake it will be sitting on. Then using a serrated knife cute the shape out of the cake below. You need to make sure you cut into the cake so that the area is level and flat. You are basically creating the illusion of the cake sitting at an angle, when in reality it is level.
Then you need to frost the exposed area and cover the cake in fondant.
I also covered the cake board in the same color fondant so that they cake has a finished look to it. Before stacking the cakes make sure and carve and cover all of your cakes in fondant. Then put your dowels (supports) in the cake. Make sure and cut the dowels all the same height so the cake is level. Then add a little buttercream to the base the cake will be sitting on and place the tiers onto each other…adjusting them until you like the position of the cake.
I then used my airbrush machine to color the fondant more of a pink color and added a pearl shimmer to it also. The lighting in the kitchen is horrible so all the colors are a little off than what they really were…basically the cake was a shimmery pink color in really life.
Then I made fondant pearls to go around the cake tiers and sprayed them with silver lust dust spray.
I decorated the sides and top of the cake with fondant cut-outs. I used stamps to get the impressions on them and then sprayed them silver too. For the topper I added fondant to silver wire and bent it to make the design.
I actually ended up adding a couple star cut-outs to the fondant base board of the cake which I think made it look better. I also wrapped the edge of the cake base board in silver ribbon to pull it all together.
Well, I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and found it helpful and inspiring! Happy Cake Baking!
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Thanks for the tips…I had no idea this was the engineering behind the topsy-turvy cake. You saved me from a long night of mistakes! Next time post one on the airbrushing! I can’t wait to try it out. Thanks again!
Wow.. this is such a mindblowing cake. I have never seen such a cake in my life! And your tutorial is perfect! I could never have figured our how you made it otherwise. Excellent. Keep up the gud work! and gud luck on your Store. I’ll be visitng the site often now.
this tutorial was great.. i have be racking my brain trying to figure this out.. my sister is having a housewarming party and wants me to make her a topsy turvy cake.. this tutorial was a huge help..
This is by far the best tutorial for these cakes Ive read. Thanks for sharing all the details!
Wow! Thank you so much for explaining this technique. I was blown away by the fact that you cut into the cake so it actually sits level. Wow again.
Ev
I need ask you something about the tupsy turvy cake ,this one in particular you said you use three differents sizes, 5,7 and 9 inch but my question is, you make 3 cakes of each size for make each cake, for example the big one three cakes of nine inches and three cakes of seven inches and the last one three cake of five inches, I thougth you need in the first cake two cakes of nine inch and one of seven inches on the bottom of this one and after you carve this one around please I need to know ,I’m a little confused. Thanks
I am so glade I found your site. I have a baby shower cake due in a month and she wanted a topsy turvy cake, I was lost. But thank you so much for the tips it will help me out so much!
Thanks for the lesson. My daughter turns 17 this Saturday. She wants a topsy turvy cake. I have never used fondant before. Can I ice and decorate the cake with all buttercream icing? Sorry for the short notice. Would appreciate any feed back. Steve
Thank you for a very informative and visual step by step. I can’t help but chuckle at these topsy turvy cakes; they look so much like the my daughter’s 10th b’day double recipe cake my son and I put together for her. We used chopsticks for dowels and, had that topsy turvy thing happening without ANY intent. Such great memories. She’s approaching late 20’s now.
That was so helpful. My daughter took courses 1 & 2 and a fondant class sponsored by Wilton at our local college. We had so much fun.Decorating seems to unwind me. I put in an old movie, sit at my island and start decorating-usually late at night.We attempted a topsy-turvy cake last year bur it didn’t turn out that great, but my granddaughter was so stoked about it and I guess that’s all that matters.
Beautiful cake! I’m curious what the sides of the cake board were covered with…in the fifth picture up from the bottom, it looks as though there are a few layers of cardboard visible…I’m sure that’s not what the finished product looked like…did you glue a ribbon around it? I loved your tutorial – it was more helpful than anything else I’ve seen out there. Thanks for sharing your secrets.
Ahhh this is a great help to me, thank you so much for sharing your work and information!
Thanks for this tutorial, but have a dobut, what is the air brush machine, and where i found that, the silver dust too, sorry for my bad writ in english, i live in Mexico country, so i ll by pedent for you request. Saludos desde Tepic Nayarit Mexico!
Wow! and more Wow!!! Thanks so much I’m starting to finally have more clients ordering cakes and it’s getting a little bit more complicated on the designs. This tutorial help me alot to make my next project.
Thanks a million……;)
You, my darling, saved the day. I had thought that I had this thing engineered in my head correctly. I was gravely mistaken! It would have been a baby shower disaster!
I can not thank yoou enough! Your photographs along with the written instruction are perfect! You could publish how to guide books. (I have never said that before.)
Again, thanks!
Tamara
Thank you so much for your detailed and upclose instructions on the topsy turvy cake. I’m a budding entreprenuer and perfecting my self-taught skills with help from wonderful people such as yourself. Thank you again for sharing.
I would like to thank you so much for taking the time to share with us how to make a topsy turvy cake. It has given me a little glimmer of hope for my first topsy turvy cake in November!
Thank you again.
Great tutorial! No questions as to how it’s done after seeing your fantastic photos. The final cake was gorgeous!
Questions & Comments… First, thank you for your site! You’ve inspired me to start cake-creating, something I never knew I would love so much! It all started when I used the princess cake you made for your niece as a guide to make my daughter’s first birthday cake – it was fantastic! I then ventured to a 5-tier topsy turvy cake, relying on this tutorial, and you should have heard all the “oohs” and “ahhs”! I love these cakes because most people are clueless how they are made and the “wow” factor is that much more!
Questions… I’m new at all this, but I LOVE working with fondant. My questions are (1) how do you serve a fondant cake? (Do you leave the fondant, or do you peel it off & re-cover with buttercream before serving?)… and (2) how do you serve a topsy turvy cake? It was quite comical watching us try to get normal, somewhat equal pieces out of that cake!
Thanks so much!!!
Amy
Roanoke, Virginia
Thank you so much for your tutorial! You made it so easy to understand, this is such a big help to me. Keep up the great work, & thanks again for sharing the knowledge!
Thanks so much for this…. I knew how to make this cake but an still looking around the internet for extra help. I really want to make this cake for my cousins 16th birthday and I need to perfect it so thanks again for putting this on here!
Hi, I’m really impressed with this tutorial. Now I knew the correct way of constructing topsy turvy. Thanks for sharing such a very informative tutorial & great tips !
This tutorial is great. thank you that you share your tips!
for each tieir do you use all the same size cake? or do you stack the larger sizes on top of the smaller one? (example: middle tieir 9-8-7)
Thank you
The best tutorial I’ve seen yet. Although I have not tried it yet it appears simple.
Thanks
Wow! What a generous spirit. God Bless You! Beautiful work. How do you serve(cut) this type of cake? Thanks.
Thank you so much. Great job on your pictures and explaining how to do this amazing cake. Made my first Topsy Turvy cake last night much stress and fear. Will deliver it today at noon. Wish I had seen you site before. But a question I still have is what type of cake do you use is it a box mix or from scratch. Which ever it is would you be willing to share that information to. Thanks again.
Jodie Phillips
Thank you for the detailed explanation. I am attempting my first try for my daughter’s Sweet Sixteen birthday! Please can you give any pointers for applying the fondant—-apply to a cold cake? Do you refrigerate for a brief time after the fondant is applied to prevent bubbles, etc.? Do you know of a good website to help with applying fondant and fondant decorations? Thank you .