Cutout Panel Wedding Cake

Happy Friday!  For the longest time I have had this cake in my "inspiration book", and I finally had a bride that picked it as her wedding cake.

Once she had picked it, then came the task of figuring out how to do it.  Well, I finally decided to use modeling chocolate panels, and I was very pleased with the results.  One tip:  initially cut the panels larger than you need - no matter how hard you try, cake will never be truly square.

I think this was also the first cake where I used smaller separators for the tiers.  I used styrofoam, coated with piping gel and covered in the same modeling chocolate I used for the panels,

Lastly, for the blue behind the cut-outs, I took a sheet of edible image paper, colored it with blue luster dusts and stuck it to the back side of the panel.  It kept me from making a big batch of blue icing and it kept icing from coming through the cutout, keeping that nice clean design the bride was looking for.