It's a Cake!

www.cakelava.com

We began working with Laressa and Daniel in January of this year for their November wedding.  They were referred by people we knew and we wanted to give them the cake of their dreams.  They desired to have a cake that was both elegant and unique and would long be remembered by their guests.  Laressa and Daniel's wedding colors were blue and white and and Rick drew inspiration for the design from the stylized blue floral motif on their invitation and wedding paperie.  Rather than put the pattern on a traditional 3-tier round, he gave the cake a modern, feminine shape with rounded edges and each tier balanced slightly above.  Laressa and Daniel were so excited about the cake when they saw their design.  I even got a nice call from Stephanie their wedding coordinator shortly before the wedding to work on the cake table.  They wanted to have just the right color linen and size for the table.  A couple after our own hearts!  The table looked perfect! The cake drew a great deal of attention when we delivered it to the beautiful Halekulani resort in Waikiki.  We had both the staff and the coordinator of the wedding surrounding the cake table, and some fascinated looks and "What is it?" questions. To which Rick smiled and proudly said "It's a cake!"

Sadly, we did not get a chance to congratulate Laressa and Daniel on the wedding day.  We really wanted to. It was a hectic weekend for us and we had to run back to our studio for Rick to work on the U.S. Marine Corps birthday cake for the following day and cakes throughout the weekend. 

Shortly after the wedding we received a sweet thank you note from Laressa which included the following:

We just came back from Hawaii and we wanted to send you and Rick a note to thank you for an amazing/tasty cake. Everyone, including the catering folks at the Halekulani, were impressed with the cake. We even took the leftovers to our honeymoon and enjoyed it with coffee and tea.

We wanted to make sure the cake stood out from the white table so Stephanie made the blue table cover with the color of the cake in mind. I am glad you guys thought it was nice :)

You guys are the best!

Laressa

Congratulations to Laressa and Daniel! 

The "Story" of Allison and Adam

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It's been over a year since we first met with our clients Allison and Adam to discuss their wedding cake design.  During our meeting the couple spoke of their love of San Francisco, where they currently reside and their desire to have a sculpted cake incorporating San Francisco landmarks of importance to them.  We thought it was a great idea!  I used to live in the Bay Area, and spent a number of years in San Francisco and was excited to revisit this spectacular city once again and Rick was too!  As we began working more closely with Allison and Adam the cake design evolved from a strictly San Francisco landmarks theme to one that included other countries and places that the couple spent time, including Hawaii, Italy, and Australia.  Their wedding cake would tell the "story" of Allison and Adam and Rick was looking forward to making it for them.

The cake was designed to work chronologically with the uniting "road" being the iconic and super curvy Lombard Street in San Francisco.  Adam and Allison were depicted near the bottom of the cake, on the start of their path -- Allison as a chef's toque and Adam represented by a surfboard.  Both Hawaii and Italy are shown here.  Adam was originally living in Hawaii attending a University here and Allison was studying abroad in Italy.  They met at the Metreon theater in San Francisco, spent time together living in San Francisco and then got married at City Hall.  Our couple was already married when they booked their wedding cake but was planning a wedding on Oahu where their family and friends could be a part of their vows and ceremony.  Their life in San Francisco made up the majority of this cake.  At the very top was Australia where the couple plans to live together. 

Rick spent many hours carefully drawing and painting every building and detail.  Considering the other cakes he was working on for the weekend which also demanded a high level of artistry, I was truly amazed at what Rick accomplished over the course of a week! You can check back on our blog throughout the week to see some of these cakes. 

When Allison and Adam chose their cake flavor, Hawaii Five-0, they had no idea how appropriate it would be at their wedding venue.  The private estate where they were married on Friday night is also "home" to one of the new "Hawaii Five-0" TV show characters, and they regularly film there.  What a coincidence!  Congratulations to Allison and Adam! 

Kindy and William's Wedding Cake

Once again, for our sweet town of Kailua, Oahu, population of approximately 45,000, and happy home of cakelava, there is excitement in the air. President elect Barack Obama has returned to the beach community of Kailua with his family in search of some R&R. Amidst the eager anticipation of local residents and businesses hoping to catch a glimpse of our next president, life in Kailua goes on as usual, and for us that means more cakes!

Saturday's wedding in Waikiki was a berry and gold colored affair for Kindy and William. Mona Hirata of Weddings by Grace & Mona coordinated their wedding, and Yvonne and Alex of Yvonne Floral designed the couple's floral arrangements, linens and lighting. Their beautiful raspberry and gold colored wedding cake was a major focal point in the room, and perfectly matched all the accents.

Their 3-tier wedding cake was a dramatic concave-shaped stunner. The gorgeous luxe gold colored floral accents were inspired by the couple's incredibly beautiful wedding invitations, designed by Stacey of Emi Ink. Rick used both the raspberry color of the invitation and the gold accents to make Kindy and William a showpiece wedding cake. For their cake Kindy and William chose our Banana Blueberry Mascarpone and Hot Fudge Sundae flavors. The red raspberry and gold tones, shimmering fabrics, and scrumptious cake flavors were perfect for a wedding less than a week before Christmas.



See Kindy and William's cake on cakelava.com in the near future

French Elegance and Cirque du Soleil Inspired

Saturday night was a bit of a circus -- literally. Our client Candes celebrated her engagement to fiance Milan in a beautiful, Cirque du Soleil inspired party in Diamond Head. She gave Rick carte blanche to design her a spectacular showpiece, using her wedding colors of soft pinks, lavenders, greens, and golds and incorporating an elegant Cirque du Soleil inspired whimsy. She was very open to design and wanted something her guests would be talking about long after the party -- mission accomplished! Shortly after the party Candes left us a voicemail saying how blown away she and her guests were by the cake. Rick had a great time making her cake and was excited about it. We were both thrilled to hear from Candes. This cake meant a lot to her and to us. She had originally tried to hire us for her wedding on the island of Lanai, but circumstances prevented us from being able to make her cake. Candes and Milan chose our Kona Toffee Crunch and Bananarama flavors to serve their guests. I wished we had taken photos of the decor but I was mesmorized by the live acrobat spinning in the ring and we needed to leave for a long trek out to the North Shore (nearly 3 hours roundtrip!). Quite the circus!

Candes and Milan, we hope you have an incredible wedding on Lanai and we'll be thinking of you!

See Candes' cake and many more new cakes on cakelava.com.

The Underwater Invertebrates Cake

The cake! - Dave Miyamoto Photography


Rick working on cake - photo by Sasha

On Saturday, June 14th it was Ricki and Mike’s wedding day, which they celebrated with a colorful custom underwater invertebrates wedding cake. You’ll recall from a previous blog titled “Godzilla and Israel Kamakawiwaole” that the components of Ricki and Mike’s wedding were quite unusual. They were married in a Japanese themed hotel banquet room, their brilliant handmade invitations featured Godzilla on them and included a CD of Hawaiian songs to be played at the wedding, and they had an underwater invertebrates sculpted wedding cake. This past weekend we had two very complicated cakes on the same night, this being one of them.

Leaving nothing to chance, we brought in the truly fabulous Dave Miyamoto Photography to capture both of Saturday’s cakes, which are already up on cakelava.com.
Dave, who is one of the nicest guys we know and an immensely talented photographer, shot images worthy of a magazine feature.

This cake was a lot of fun for Rick to make and the colors really popped! So what kind of flavors does an underwater invertebrates cake have? Ricki and Mike chose tropical flavors -- the pink colored Guava Lava for their cake cutting and Hawaii Five-0 on the top 2 tiers.
We hope their wedding was everything they dreamed it would be!