Unicorn Cake: A Tale Of Two Horns

WHO CORNED IT BETTER!? A tale of two horns, The Case Of The Buttercream Kawaii Unicorn Cake by Lyndsay Sung. I dunno why, but for some reason the unicorn cake has always been my nemesis. My kryptonite, the sparkling green mega-crystal that has doomed me into stress levels unknown to womyn. Yes there are a gazillion mystical unicorn cakes out there and the original design by Jenna Rae Cakes is indeed AWESOME! It gives all the necessary hints of a unicorn – swirls and twirls of dreamy buttercream hair, the sometimes phallic horn(y) horn, ears and for the face – two simple lines for eyes, sometimes eyelashes – but without providing a full face. I really wanted to design a unicorn cake in my own style – and the hard part was – THE MOUTH. Now I know why none of these cakes have mouths. Doing a uni-mouth on a round cake is hard!! It’s a horse snout, so there needs to be a semblance of snout-ness… but a snout can also sometimes skedaddle into pig face territory … another unicorn cake fear of mine…

The one above, was my first unicorn attempt in quite a while, made for an amazing old client of mine who happens to have the coolest kids. Five-year-old Banksy requested a rainbow unicorn cake for his birthday, and I would never deny making a rainbow unicorn cake for a kid named BANKSY! So while this was my first unicorn in several months, I DO have one in my upcoming cake book Coco Cake Land but his little face will be a surprise until the book is released, hehe. I wanted to try a top-of-the-cake unicorn face and a different piping style for the fur. So, once again I took to my sketchbook:

A lil dainty smile for my friend Uni???

Or, no smile, like this No Mouth Joe? (They also look kinda like the cutest Carmen Miranda haired unicorns.)

Teddy tried his hand at a unicorn too – CUTE!

I tried several looks for this guy, no mouth, mouth, different nostrils, etc etc… frantic texts to my sister with a bunch of photos asking her to choose… Sister’s response: “You’re overthinking this.” But in the end, No Mouth Joe it was!! The more I look at this guy’s face, the more stoked I become. He is pretty darn cute. And again, “no mouth” sometimes feels “cuter”, Hello Kitty style, than mouth…?

No Mouth Joe’s beautiful buttercream mane!

NEXT up, a month or so later, I got an email from ANOTHER favourite old client Rose – her daughter Ava was turning ten and requested… yup, MY OLD PAL UNICORN! I took it as another chance to fiddle with the design and have some fun with the face.

Once again, I had finished everyyyything to my satisfaction, until the face/mouth combo. I took the teensy mouth off, put it back on, took it off, then put it back on – I thought the smiley face was pretty cute! Then I decided to try an extra smiley unicorn cake with the happy overjoyed closed eyes, hehe.

In the end, I think I love this one too!!!

Also: YAY for short three letter names so I can use my fave new puffy pink neon letter stickers from the Japanese dollar store!!

And a buttercream rosette and drop star mane never to be forgotten, with a dash of sprinkles. Sigh. I’d love to know what your favourite one is – No Mouth Joe, or Smiley Eyes?? Either way, this was a fun exercise in cake design! I have a feeling the next one will look different again… and so ends the first saga of A Tale Of Two Horns… xo Lyndsay