How important is your wedding cake?

The cake is an important part of our day and one of the first things we organised. We wanted to keep the tradition of cutting the cake even though we are having a cupcake tower - hence the top tier is going to be a traditional fruit cake. However, I do recognise that wedding cake is usually one of the things that a lot of people won't eat (especially if they have been filled with canapes, 3 course meal and an evening buffet as they will be on our day) and as such we didn't want to break the bank when it came to cost.

It's really important to me...not just because I love cake though! There are some stunning cakes recently and I think it's really traditional to have the cutting of the cake.

Not very important to us really...

See I am bias being a cake decorator but find people seem to prefer the supermarkets like M&S etc purely down to cost but when you astually break it down its not very cost effective at all as they are smaller both width and height and then with basic added extras can become very expensive after for another artificial type filling.

I think people these days are just looking for cheap .... I think they are so pretty and add to the day they are that personal bit of art made especially for you but again very bias on this myself lol x

I agree tho £700 + is ridiculous and I'm in the industry some people here wedding infront of cake and they justify it by adding a couple more £100 for the use of the word wedding

I think with an budget, however big or small you have to priotise what is important to you. The cake is not so important to us. The M&S cakes look fab but plain, but i have seen some lovely self-decorated cakes with ribbons and pearl. All this for approx £70, that will do us!!!!!

Its important- because i love cake! we are having cupcakes (which is desert) and one tier of sponge- to cut. but that is costing very cheap- it doubles up as a desert so we arent having desert and i completly dont get the ppl who spend hundreds on cake!

The wedding cake is very important to us, and because of this we have spent a lot more than a standard M&S cake on it.

My mom describes the wedding cake as being the centrepiece of the reception and it's also going to be used as dessert for our wedding too, which makes it moreso important.

Not important to me at all. I don't really believe in all the frittery around weddings like it "being your first task together".

We're giving plenty of food to our guests and more often than not the cake gets taken home and put somewhere till it dries out, then it gets binned.

My b2b's mum is making a cake and a friend is decorating it for us, so the cost to us is minimal, but if it wasn't for that we'd probably have gone for the cheaper option too - I'm sure nobody would complain if we bought out several trays full of Mr Kipling's finest either. Certainly wouldn't think of spending £500 on a cake.

The cake is important to us too. I've been taking cake dec classes for two years, so this will be an opportunity to really utilise my new skills. Hoping to do lots of sugar (well, porcelain) flowers which we'd never be able to afford to pay a professional to do. i love thinking about all the things i could do with the cake!

We both dont particularly like fruit cake and neither of us like the traditional "tiered" look, so have gone for the cupcakes and then a mig choccy gooey cake for the top to cut. We had a reasonable quote and loved her decorative style so chose that. Definitely wouldnt spend more than £150 though as i think you can really go overboard.

We really wanted a cake, we got married abroad and had a cake made by the lovely (and fantastically talented) Jules.40 on hitched.

Was important to us to have it as it make our wedding reception back here more "weddingy", but I didnt want to pay hundreds of pounds as it was there more as a symbol originally, and we then decided to use it as the dessert following our hot buffet as when we tasted the samples it was AMAZING!

I certainly wouldnt have paid hundreds of pounds for a cake.....well, maybe I would since it was gorgeous!

We had a lemon tier, and 2 chocolate tiers....this is the only pic I have of it on this computer!

It's kinda important as we want the tradition of cuting the cake, Pretty much saw the cake I wanted staright away which made the wholeprocess easier. It will only be small though.

Three tier but only big enough to let the guests all have some. The top teir is very small and just for us. Its sponge and the rest is fruit - I dont like fruit cake.

To be blunt, I think the wedding industry has created the myth that you need to have a huge multi-tiered wedding cakes and attached extra significance to them (ie, the statement that this symbolizes your first duty as couple to cut the cake) to "sell" the experience.

Wedding cakes used to be simple affairs, but now they are huge and cost silly money. A 3 layer cheese cake I've seen advertised for 300 pounds...

I think we are going to ask a friend to bake a cake.

That's happened to a lot of things surrounding weddings, and as you say the wedding industry is fairly self serving in promoting all sorts of unnecessaries as "essentials" and, of course, because "everybody else has it" you end up somehow feeling that you're having an inferior day if you don't.

Although of course there are a number of benefits with being on places like Hitched, it doesn't help when so many people fall for the hard-sell marketing tricks of suppliers promoting all their 'must haves' that you really don't need, and again you end up feeling a bit "left out" if you don't have "it".

Very important to me as I make and decorate cakes ? Actually, it's just as important because I love eating cake ?

Jules40 - if you're around, can I be nosey and ask how you did the middle of tier of that cake? I'm trying to work it out from the photo but I can't (but then it is Friday and I'm having an exceptionally blonde day!)

Avtually they used to be much more elaborate!!

Look at these beauties from the 20's, 30's 40's 50's etc

I love cake so it was really important to me! The cutting of the cake is one of the moments that im looking forward to on the day.

To be honest I kind of had an approx budget of £350.00 - but with buying the crystal cake topper & diamante beading & the surprise groom cake its nearer £500.00! But i really love cake. Im having some cake left in our bridal suite along with champagne for after the party & ive also made it clear to venue that any leftover cake is NOT to be be put out with evening buffet - I want any left over cake to go home with us, our parents, bridal party etc the following day. We are having a cupcake tower for our evening do instead.

WSS!!! i think my H2B is SUPER excited about the cake.....because i make and decorate them all the time (and have to be creative alot!) ive said to him he can decided what the cakes like completely.......hes got an idea at the moment of a 'themed' cake (cos we got engaged in Cuba) but god knows what the final thing will end u like ?

As a cake maker myself I am really looking forward to doing our wedding cake, but if I wasn’t doing this I wouldn’t spend a lot of money on it as it is just cake! But then again I am not planning on spending a lot of money on my wedding dress, bridesmaid dresses, my OH, ushers and best man outfits, or flowers and decoration!

We have planned the wedding meticulously to save as much money as possible, as though the day is important, it is not so important that I want us to be in debt or spend the equivalent of a house deposit on one day!? That to me is crazy, if you have money to burn then fine but why start your married life in debt just because you HAD to have THAT dress or THAT cake?

The one thing we have spent more money on is the TOG as he will provide the lasting memories of the day so we spent a lot of time finding the right one for us, even though he was more expensive than others we looked at.

It's important for us to have a cake and cut it, but I wouldn't have spent loads on it. My mum is making ours, and she made my sister's so I think that's a nice touch x

My OH is a really good cake maker (lucky me!) and has made wedding cakes for friend's weddings instead of a traditional gift at their request.

Personally I love cake, and if he wasnt making me a 5 tier spectacular I would still def have one.

However it is clear from seeing him make other cakes that the costs of a 3 tier, multi flavour, sponge cake nicely iced with ribbon and a topper, with decent quality ingredients (we bought eveything from waitrose inc free range eggs etc) came to about £50-70. I appreciate people's time goes into making the cake and there are a lot of decent, hardworking cake makers out there, just the same as TOG's etc, unfortunately a few completely take the p*ss with the tag "wedding cake" , charge a fortune and put loads of people off.

Also I think it's important if you have a cake to nicely display it so people can see it, too often it is hidden in a corner, cut very quickly and then sliced and but in a dark corner with the buffet which is a shame as the beautiful creation cannot be appreciated.

Historically the cake, and the cutting of the cake, has been an important part of a wedding reception. That's where the idea of keeping the top tier for your firstborn's christening developed from. As Sherrie says, what we see now is a diluted very from the incredibly fancy ones of yesteryear, just the pricing has gone up!

As for us, having some sort of cake was important to us - I also think it's important to a lot of the older generation that they can witness the occasion that is 'the cutting of the cake'. We decided to go for a several tiered 'cake' made from truckles of cheese. We'll be serving a cheese and port course so it fits in well with our plans.

I don't feel like this about Hitched. I don't want to spend a lot and as long as it tastes nice I will be happy. I intend to go to M&S for ours and perhaps decorate it with fresh flowers. Our venue co-ordinator actually recommended M&S as she says they are so good. I don't feel 'left out' though. I think you'll find a lot of Hitcher's aren't spending huge amounts on theirs and are either going to M&S (or the like) or having a friend/relative make it.

AJ, you always mention that you feel inferior because you're not having certain things at your wedding and others are - what are these things? Off the top of my head you're having favours, a sweetie table, chair covers and a cake so what else is left?

As for your comment about the suppliers (this seems to be a running theme with you now), am I the only one who finds the suppliers helpful rather than nuisances that are trying to brainwash us with their products and services? Me and my daughter would never have found our tiaras if it wasn't for Lynsey's Designs posts and Sherrie's help in particular has been invaluable and I have not paid for a single one of her sevices. I have received a gorgeous free certificate box from Puddy Cards as well, which is another example of suppliers using Hitched to be helpful and kind to others.

Anyway, we're having a M&S wedding cake with flowers on to decorate.

I wouldn't say it was a hugely important part of the day / prep for us, but was still something we wanted. We were fortunate (so it seems) to find someone who made gorgeous cake and at a reasonable price. Our 4 tier cake with deoration and delivery was £260. Yes, it was probably bigger than we needed in the end but we wanted all the different flavour layers!

We were originally going for an M&S cake but for the little bit extra (Are they still £200?), we got our own design, more servings, delivery on the day and it was also then suitable for the allergies of my Dad and niece. What we paid (although actually, it was my nan's gift to us) was probably about the ceiling limit.

She has since made cakes for my Dad's 60th and I have also asked her to make the cake for H's 30th.

Goodness, aj, as Eleanor Roosevelt once said 'no one can make you feel inferior without your consent'. Be happy with what you've got and the choices you've made.

I've never felt pressured into opting for x,y and z just because a HIB or Hitcher has suggested something. If that was the case I'd have worn 10 necklaces and thutty bangles on each arm.

Anyway, back to the original subject. We had cupcakes and a top cutting cake* and I don't think they were over priced. They looked and tasted marvellous and we couldn't not have had one as I love baking and cooking & my friends would keel over if I didn't have a super duper cake! Now I am baking a lot of cakes for friends I know how much time, love & effort goes into each one so I think sometimes the price is highly justified.

*Hitched awards cake of the year 2010 dontchaknow

You could have a cutting cake shaped like a cigar! ?

The cake was one of the first things we decided - that we weren't going to have one! I've been to so many weddings now where the cake doesn't get eaten, because (like someone else mentioned) guests have been well fed, that we felt we would be better off allocating that budget elsewhere (ie. more wine -yum!).

Must admit the grandmas weren't tto impressed when we told them and we got a lot of 'but you have to, it's tradition!'. I said that if they could give me one good solid reason for having a cake then we would consider it - but they couldn't!

That's not to say I think everyone should think like us! I have seen some beautiful cakes - and if it's important to you then go for it - it just wasn't for us.

And what a fine specimen of a cake it was!

"Make cupcakes, not war!"

haha dont joke..........hes got this diea of having 3 tiers, the tops beach themed with him on one knee...fading into the greeny blue sea.....with all sea theemd things we found.........then fding into sky and palm trees..with the cuban flag, cigars and bottles of rum dotted all ove the place........!!

All because he saw a themed wedding cake made to looked like a ski slope..........!!