How to make a wired hydrangea bouquet with fondant or gum paste

Today, I am gonna show you how to make wired hydrangeas from fondant or gum paste and how to assemble the flowers into a small bouquet or hydrangea ball.

I love to decorate cakes with hydrangeas. Sometimes I just make them without florist wire and attach them to the cake with edible glue. At other occasions, I assemble the hydrangeas into a small bouquet. In this tutorial I will show you how to make the hydrangeas and how to wire the flowers together to form a bouquet / cake decoration.

You will need:
Fondant or gum paste / sugar paste
Cutter and veiner for a hydrangea
Non-stick board or an ordinary cutting board
Rolling Pin for fondant
Plastic Bag
Paste color (optional)
Color dust (optional)
Corn-starch duster
Tylo powder (only if you use fondant)
A mold for drying the flowers, e.g. a painter’s palette, flower former cups or a Toffifee/Toffifay chocolate tray – only the tray, you have to eat the chocolate first 😉
Edible glue
Paint brushes (1 for applying glue and 1-2 brushes for applying the dust colors)
Floral Wire, gauge size 24
Green or white floral tape
Wirecutter & pliers

Directions:

1) Start by coloring your fondant or gum paste in your desired color. You dip a toothpick in a paste color and stroke the color across the fondant surface. Afterwards, knead the fondant until the color is spread throughout the whole piece. When the fondant has the correct color, you can add a pinch of tylo powder. This makes the fondant easier to work with (only if you use fondant).

Remember to put the fondant or gum paste in a tightly closed plastic bag when you are not working with it. Otherwise, it dries and gets destroyed. Use only the amount you need and leave the rest in the bag in the meantime.

2) Take a non-stick board and add some corn starch with your duster. Also, use the corn starch on your rolling pin so the fondant won’t stick.

3) In this tutorial, I have not colored the fondant with a paste color, I will color the flower afterwards with color dust. Roll out the fondant / gum paste. Roll it out thinly, but not paper thin!

4) Cut out the flowers with your hydrangea cutter. Make as many flowers as you need.

5) Protect the flowers with a plastic bag or some plastic film except for the one you are working with. I use a storage board from Wilton.

6) Dust the veiner with some corn starch and place the flower in the veiner

7) Push the veiner together with your finger.

8) Remove the flower – be careful.

Take some floral wire and cut it into 3 pieces with a wirecutter.

Bend the end of the wire into a small hook using pliers and bend the hook like in the pictures.

Dip the hook in edible glue.

Place the flower on top of the hook and attach it to the edible glue.

9) Place your flower in a Tofifee/Toffifay tray, a flower former cup or painter’s palette and let it dry for some hours, preferably a day. If you use a Tofifee tray or painter’s palette, you need to cut a small hole in the bottom to make room for the florist wire. In the picture I have placed the flower in a flower former cup, but it is actually a bit too flat – try to find something that curves a bit more.

How to color and assemble the hydrangea