Tuesday, January 7, 2014

2013 - A Year in Review - The Second Half - A.E.C., Part 4

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Finishing up our 2013 Year in Review with selected cakes made in October through December. If you are just joining us and want to look back on the previous months featured cakes, check out Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

In 2013 we received many requests for unconventional cake designs for both weddings and birthdays, and quite a few with handcrafted figurines. These requests came in throughout the year but event dates mostly fell towards the end of 2013. This trend of untraditional, highly customized cake requests followed us into 2014. As I write this, Rick is working on a most unusual wedding cake, for a couple marrying this weekend. Watch the blog in the coming days for more on this cake!

The cake above was made for Joe and Tracy, a couple who resides on the mainland and came to Oahu to celebrate Tracy's 50th birthday. The surprise cake was ordered by Joe for his lucky wife - was she ever surprised! Rick sculpted Oahu's iconic Diamond Head out of cake and made a lovely Hawaiian beach scene with the couple relaxing on the beach. He worked on the custom figurines over the course of a couple days and during that time we had photos of Joe and Tracy all over his workspace. When we delivered the cake it was the first time we met the couple in person and it felt like we already knew them!

We received a special note from the couple shortly after raving about their cake:

"The cake was absolutely wonderful, Tracy was completely blown away and everybody really got a kick out of it. People were taking more pictures of that cake than the performers. It really did make the night for us. The folks at the Luau took pictures as well to post on their Facebook page. So again thank you, thank you, thank you for your hard work and obvious talent. Rick you are an artist and I am a fan. Thank you again!" - Joe & Tracy

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Heather and Joe also chose a non-traditional design - a sculpted Jeep with paddleboards, and we were all so pleased with the outcome! Their sculpted Jeep wedding cake combined two trends we saw in 2013 - non-traditional wedding cakes and complex sculpted vehicles.

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From a bright orange Jeep to a badass Monster Truck, and a vibrant purple Mini Cooper 60th Birthday cake - that's how we rolled!

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 The year wouldn't be complete without at least one electric guitar cake and we were thrilled to make this beauty for a 70th birthday celebration. The cake looked so realistic, people wanted to pick it up and play it!

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One of our favorite cakes of the year was the cake Rick made for Alex's 40th birthday party.  It was special to us because we have worked with Alex of Mood Event and his wife Yvonne of Yvonne Design since we opened. They have wowed us and our clients with their fabulous event and floral design for years, and we were honored when Yvonne contacted us to make his special surprise! Alex  loves competitive running so Rick made a custom figurine of him running on a wooded trail, towards the finish line of his 40 K. The cake combined some of Rick's favorite art techniques - sculpting, painting, airbrushing, and modelling.

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The cake Rick made for Dustin's ProService retirement party was also a lot of fun and included a handcrafted figure. Rick sculpted a giant wave made from guava cake and added a handcrafted figure of Dustin riding his new surfboard (a gift from his coworkers). We were asked to give Dustin the relaxed look of someone in their retirement - so we had him sporting a five-o clock shadow. A bunch of handmade plumeria flowers were placed on the cake to give the cake a Hawaiian touch!

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Our second Seuss themed cake happened towards the end of the year. Our client fell in love with some of the 3-tier fun wonky cakes but wanted less servings, so Rick designed her a very cute and colorful cake with some of her favorite characters. It was adorable!

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Like Heather and Joe, Sayo and Torrell also ordered a non-traditional wedding cake and asked Rick to design a cake inspired by Shuri Castle in Okinawa, Japan. Read the full details about the cake and the Shisa guardians on the top of the cake in this post.

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We also made some incredibly beautiful, more traditional wedding cakes, like the one shown above. For Elizabeth and Patrick's wedding cake, Rick piped a lace design from the bride's dress and added a gorgeous cascade of handcrafted orchids and calla lillies.

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We also used handcrafted green orchids for this lovely cake, in addition to the pink hibiscus flowers. Rick placed a beautiful bunch of handmade flowers on the side of their cake and accented it with bamboo borders. The cake was so beautiful in person!

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Rick's elegant and whimsical cake with handcrafted delicate roses and a painted teacup was made for Harper's first birthday party. Harper's parents are clients of ours - we first worked with them at their wedding several years ago and we were thrilled the mainland-based couple returned to Oahu to celebrate for their daughter's first birthday luau!

We have more 2013 cakes selected to share with you, and will be doing so on the blog in the coming days. Cakes we'll be showcasing include another sculpted non-traditional wedding cake and a tall wedding cake with pretty flowers with jeweled centers, both made shortly before the New Year. We hope you've enjoyed our retrospective and we look forward to sharing more in 2014! Thank you so much to everyone who has shown their support in various ways to us throughout the year!




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