This is my “It’s Christmas!” tutorial from Issue 131, Winter 2015-2016 from Cakes & Sugarcraft Magazine, there is a wonderful photograph in the magazine taken by Alister Thorpe, these are just my snaps I took before I drove to the photoshoot in Surrey.

For this Christmas Cake I was given a brief to design to. They wanted a night scene using an all navy cake with Father Christmas and his sleigh on the top tier and a hand painted Christmas Village at the base.

So I searched the internet for Christmas cards for inspiration, and chose ideas or details from six different Christmas cards to help with the design.

I used flower paste for the cut out buildings and bridge and squires kitchen colours to paint them.

The mountains were airbrushed and then stippled with royal icing. Father Christmas and his sleigh were piped, as were the trees.

The snow around the river was painted with silver light grey for highlights. The river was navy icing painted and then flooded with piping gel.

The bridge was my favourite part to make.

I had great fun making it, but it is always funny making Christmas Cakes in August when the photoshoot was. I hope you like it :)