insideKENT Magazine Issue 77 - August 2018 | Page 86

WEDDINGS IT’S ALL ABOUT THE CAKE BASED IN MAIDSTONE, BLUEBELL KITCHEN IS RUN BY MOTHER AND DAUGHTER TEAM, ERICA AND CHARLIE BELL. THEY BEGAN THEIR CAKE COMPANY IN 2012, STARTING ON A PART-TIME BASIS AS THEY BOTH DESIGNED AND BAKED THE ORDERS THAT CAME IN. THE QUALITY OF THE CAKES AND THE SKILL THAT WENT INTO CREATING THEM SOON MEANT THAT THEY BOTH NEEDED TO WORK FULL TIME ON THE BUSINESS, AND IT HAS GROWN SUBSTANTIALLY SINCE. BETWEEN THEM, ERICA AND CHARLIE DESIGN, BAKE AND DECORATE CAKES THAT ARE PERFECT FOR CELEBRATIONS, CORPORATE EVENTS AND, OF COURSE, WEDDINGS. Bluebell Kitchen work across London and the South East, and have won plenty of awards for their hard work including being named the Wedding Cake Designer of the Year at the Kent Wedding Awards 2015. insideKENT got the lowdown from Erica and Charlie about what makes a wedding cake so special, what the current trends are, and why it really should be all about the cake. At Bluebell Kitchen, we believe your wedding cake is much more than simply a dessert; it’s an integral part of your wedding day. We work with every couple individually, which then enables us to design a wedding cake that is a u nique showpiece and that reflects their personalities. Sugar flowers, marbled wedding cakes and gorgeous lace texturing appear to be very strong in 2018, along with more whimsical personally styled macaron towers. Sugar flowers – and we mean stunning, very realistic sugar flowers – are back with a bang this year. From the traditional delicate white roses to bright, vibrant birds of paradise, they provide a truly sophisticated finish to any 86 wedding cake; even a textured buttercream cake. While they are one of the more expensive ways to finish a wedding cake, they can be kept forever and are a beautiful memento of one of the most important days of your life. tier for an intimate wedding, or a double stack five-tier extravaganza. This even works with a winter wedding using delicate lace snowflakes rather than traditional cutouts and piping. For a minimalist, modern wedding, marble is perfect. It has been quietly building in momentum for the past couple of years and has really come into its own in early 2018. Grey tones to create a stone-like finish are the most popular, but mixing them up with pretty pastels or bright bold foliage can create a stunning and dramatic wedding cake. The marble and sugar flower combination is a personal favourite of ours at Bluebell Kitchen. Macarons are an absolute favourite of ours. We have noticed a definite move away from having a small macaron tower simply placed next to the main wedding cake as an extra sweet treat. Instead, they are now the main event, finished with gorgeous fresh flowers at the top and base of the tower, often raised to give an even bigger impact. Alternatively, whimsical macaron wedding cakes finished in pastel hues, edible gold leaf (metallic hints are as popular as ever) and fresh roses within the macarons themselves are perfect for a 2018 country style wedding. Replicating the lace from your dress to your wedding cake has always been popular, but with advances in cake lace (a fun, flexible and very easy to use alternative to traditional royal icing) the contrasting lace effect on a wedding cake has got a whole lot more delicate and we believe we are going to be seeing a lot of this throughout this year and into 2019. We believe this takes your wedding cake to another level in sophistication and becomes the real showpiece of the room, whether on a tiny two In our opinion, it looks as though the following year is going to be full of truly creative trends and possibly finally (dare we say it) a tentative move away from naked cakes. 01622 210980 [email protected] www.bluebellkitchen.co.uk