Cardboard Props: How to Make a Prop Cake (French Fancies)

So I had to make a prop cake... a rather specific one, a 'French Fancie' After doing some intensive research on the cake *dabs some icing from the corner of her mouth* I think I finally got one that looks right... it's a little bigger than it should be... but hey... who cares ? ;)

This prop would be great for kids to use as toys, perhaps at teddy bears picnics, playing shop or whatever.

If you like it rate it, if you make it show me.

Step 1: Ingredients

What you'll need:

• Cardboard
• Glue gun
• Glue sticks
• PVA Glue
• Scissors
• Craft knife
• Ruler
• Pencil
• Toilet roll
• 4 Cake cases
• Paint
• Paint brush
• Small object to use as the bump on top of the cake (I used the lid off a miniature whiskey bottle *hic*

Step 2: REASEARCH!

so I made some rough measurements of the cake and drew up a basic design on a piece of paper... Pretty standard really... Mine is a little bigger than the real cake, but that wont matter once it's on stage.

Step 3: Slice the Cake... I Er... Mean Cardboard

Simple as pie... I drew and cut out the sides of the cake, I didn't bother making a cube like you used to do in maths when you where a kid, because it doesn't really work in cardboard.

Step 4: Think Outside the Box

I'm not trying to dumb things down here... It's just real simple... using your glue gun, glue the box together

Step 5: BUMP!

Using a ruler find the center point of your box, and glue on your bump making device... i used a whiskey bottle lid, just simply glued it in place.

Step 6: Papier Mache

I used just white tissue paper (loo roll) on this little cake, because i find using newspaper will show through when you paint the item. I only did a few layers just to make it look like the icing one would ordinarily find on the real life cake (before i have eaten it)

I'm not going to teach anyone to suck eggs regarding papier mache... but i generally use a 2:1 ratio of glue to water and when on a small none structural project like this use just tissue paper.

Make sure you let the tissue and glue mix dry for a good 24 hours before you move onto the next step.

Step 7: Icing Time!

Give your dried cardboard cake a liberal coating of paint and leave to dry (or if your impatient like me attack it with a hair dryer to speed up the process)

Step 8: It's All About the Details.

Next i painted on the little white stripes of icing that the cakes have on top... simple really...

Step 9: Cake Cases!

I glued a couple of cake cases to the sides of the cake, because i didn't have cake cases big enough to glue directly on.  I used my glue gun, because it's just a lot faster

Step 10: Good Enough to Eat!

Well that's it really ... why don't you experiment with all different types of cakes Since i have to make 10 trays of prop food, i may add some more photo's so stay tuned.

Let me know what you think!

Thanks for reading

-Biggsy