Part of the joy of being a cake decorator is the frequent unusual request, so I jumped at the chance to do a cake in the shape of a pigeon basket for the 70th birthday! I’d also wanted to do a basketweave cake for ages, so this was a great excuse (if a rather large canvas for my first attempt).

Massive chocolate cake with layers of vanilla buttercream (cake dimensions 16 inches x 8 inches x 8 inches tall); all edible save for the open “lid”, which was a decorated thin cake board.

Basketweave effect was made using handrolled pieces of teddy bear brown sugarpaste (Renshaw), individually placed. Took hours! The door flap was done more quickly using a Patchwork Cutters embosser, as I wanted a different contrasting texture. I then airbrushed it and used spray edible lacquer for shine.

The pigeons were sculpted from rice krispie marshmallow cake (what would we do without that stuff?), and the vintage “pigeon clock”* at the base of the cake is also in layered chocolate cake. There were two pigeons on the finished cake, but I took the photos before adding the final bird.

• I had to do some serious googling for this cake…who knew that “pigeon clocks” were a thing? I even found a museum of pigeon clocks on my internet travels…now that is a niche attraction! :-) )