Review of Colette Peter’s, “A Piece of Cake”

If I could give Colette Peter’s 10 stars for my review of her Craftsy Class titled, “A Piece of Cake”, I definitely would.

Now, that might make me seem like the president of her fan club, but I’m not the kind of decorator that runs for president. I’m the kind of decorator that definitely will gush when appropriate and pay homage to a cake master! Mastering whimsy is what this class is all about. Collette is world famous for her whimsical cake designs….call them extravagant, fanciful, excessively playful, or imaginative. Whatever adjective you prefer, make sure you include “fantastic” in your description.

As a long time admirer of Colette’s signature whimsical, topsy-turvy, crooked-cake creations, I was looking very forward to taking this class and was hoping to learn more than a few things. This class exceeded my expectations. You will learn how to carve different shapes into a cake and learn the best way to cover those shapes. One of my favorite tips that she shares involves smoothing those interesting shapes that are carved. If you take this class and catch even one of her tips, you will be forever grateful. Anyone familiar with the Craftsy platform knows that when you buy a class you have it for life, so you can watch the class over and over to your heart’s content. Watching Colette again is strongly advised, as she gives so much of her decorating experience and tips that I don’t know if it’s possible to absorb it all at once!

This class will appeal to all levels of cake decorating. If you’ve been decorating cakes for 10 years, 10 months or 10 days, you will learn something that is brilliant. Of course, artistically it helps to have a master’s degree in painting and years of experience as a Tiffany designer, but what Colette does is explain her design process in simple terms. One goal she clearly gets across is to have fun and make the design your own with the building blocks she provides. She demonstrates carving the cake, covering the cake, making all the design elements and embellishments and then she puts it all together. Her methods differ in that for this particular design, she works on decorating each tier before she even stacks them all together. Now that doesn’t stop her from further embellishment, though… and she shows you how to “go with the flow” of the cake. It’s very cute what she does with her fringed bow at the very top tier of the cake. I think she even surprised herself!

My project from Colette's Piece of Cake online cake decorating class

One tool that she uses when she is quilting is called a pounce wheel. Colette demonstrated how she uses this tool for its ability to swivel and follow a pattern other than a straight line. I love how she was able to embed the flower design into the fondant using this technique. You will also learn how to craft ribbon roses, “chubby roses and leaves”, puffy flowers, fringed bows, hearts, curlicues, lace and lots of other “Colette-style” embellishments and inlay work. Her cake project is really dual purpose in that one side of the cake is classically decorated which makes the whimsically colorful and playful side really pop. It’s like getting two cake classes for the price of one!

As I stated at the beginning of my review, I was always a big fan of Colette Peter’s style of decorating. Now I can also state that I am a big fan of her teaching style as well. She is warm, funny and a total pleasure to watch and you can see her evident love of teaching. I would not hesitate to take another one of her classes and highly recommend this class to all cake decorators that would like to incorporate a playful style into their cake decorating. It’s no wonder she travels the world teaching and this class is a bargain for such a world-class teacher!

Does Piece of Cake! With Collete Peters sound right for you? Purchase it here for 25% Off! Not ready to purchase? Then we recommend starting with one of Craftsy's free mini cake decorating classes!