Here, you’ll find 18 summer cake ideas to celebrate your birthday, a pool party, or a beach party. Whether you’re looking for inspiration to place an order with your local baker, or you want to recreate one of these cakes yourself thanks to the guidance I provide, you’re in the perfect place.
How to find a summer cake idea suited to your cake-decorating level?
I’ve come up with a system. The cake ideas are presented to you according to their level of difficulty. There are three categories :
What Are Beginner Cake Ideas?
These are easy cake ideas. If you’ve never decorated a cake before (or only did it once or twice), these are the cakes that you should pay attention to.
- What you’ll find: Beautiful cake ideas that only require basic cake decorating techniques. This is a great place to start your journey.
What Are Intermediate Cake Ideas?
Low Intermediate Baker: If you are confident that you’ve mastered the cake decorating basics, such as how to smooth a cake, but feel like you still have a lot of techniques to learn apart from this foundation, this category is perfect for you.
- What you’ll find: Cake ideas that require both basic decorating skills and one or two techniques that are a little bit more advanced. This is a great place to grow your cake-decorating skills.
High Intermediate Baker: If you’ve mastered both basic techniques and several more advanced cake decorating techniques, these cake ideas are made for you.
- What you’ll find: Stunning cake ideas that can be fairly challenging, but are a great place to get even better than you already are.
What Are Advanced Cake Ideas?
If you consider yourself an experienced cake decorator and have mastered most of the decorating techniques, including the use of fondant, then this is the perfect place for you.
- What you’ll find: Showstopping and challenging cake ideas, perfect to sharpen and maintain your skills.
The Grading System
Finally, I’ve also assigned a grade of difficulty to each cake inspiration: 1/5 being the easiest design and 5/5 being the hardest. The goal is to make the ranking the most accurate possible. You will find this to be particularly helpful if you happen to fall in the Beginner or the Intermediate Cake Ideas categories.
Growth Tip : This list is great a place to set goals about your cake decorating skills. Pin this post and come back later to tell us how far you’ve come in your cake decorating journey !
How to follow the instructions of the designs.
For the cake designs in the beginner category: I’ll provide written instructions on how to recreate the cake idea presented to you. Don’t hesitate to watch video tutorials about basic techniques such as how to smooth a cake.
For the designs in the intermediate category: I’ll provide some guidance on how to perform the more complicated techniques.
For the advanced category: you are an experienced baker, at this point, and you will find great opportunities to put this experience to use. To be completely honest, I cannot make myself several cake ideas from the advanced category, so trust your abilities and go for it.
Find the perfect summer cake idea for your baking skills.
Growth Tip : If you aim to get better at cake decorating, you should choose a cake idea that feels sligthly above your current cake decorating level. Get out of your comfort zone !
Summer Cake Ideas For Beginner Bakers
Here, you’ll find 3 easy summer cake decorating ideas perfect for beginner bakers.
Easy Summer Cakes
White Summer Cake
Difficulty Level: 1/5.
What you will need :
- Enough frosting to cover your cake.
- Summer-themed cake toppers and decorations.
How to recreate this cake?
- First, you must crumb-coat the cake to avoid any crumbs in your final design. Apply a thin and even coat of frosting with your offset spatula all around your cake.
- Smooth it with your bench scraper, holding it at a 45-degree angle on the cake while spinning your turntable. Your bench scraper isn’t supposed to move, only turn the table.
- It doesn’t have to be perfect as it only is the first coat. Chill the cake 20 to 30 minutes in the fridge (until your frosting sets).
- Then, apply a thicker coat of frosting and repeat the smoothing operation. Fill in any gaps and smooth the cake again. Repeat this operation until the cake looks smooth enough for you. Here, you’ll find a video tutorial of the covering process, if needed.
- Next, chill your cake in the fridge for 30 minutes or until your buttercream cover sets.
- Use a knife warmed with water if you want sharp edges on your cake.
- Finally, add your cake toppers and cake decorations.
What you’ve learned :
As a cake decorator, the very first technique you have to master is how to frost a cake properly.
Blue Summer Cake.
Difficulty Level: 1,5/5.
What you will need:
- Enough frosting to cover your cake.
- Hawaïi themed cake toppers and decorations.
- Cake toppers and decorations (you can use your favorite sweets as cake decorations).
How to recreate this cake?
- First, crumb coat and cover your cake as explained in the previous cake design.
- Then, place your spatula at the top of the side of your cake and start spinning the turntable while slowly moving down to create texture.
- Finally, add your cake toppers and cake decorations.
What you’ve learned :
Cake toppers and cake decorations are the beginner cake decorator’s best friends. They allow you to create showstopping cake designs using very simple techniques.
Summer Cake Ideas Perfect For Intermediate Bakers
Here, you’ll find 8 summer cake ideas perfect for intermediate bakers.
Summer Sun Cake.
Difficulty Level: 2,5/5 (Low-Intermediate).
If you’re looking for a summer cake that perfectly suits the theme but is not too childish, you’ll love this color palette.
A little guidance
Apply your buttercream cover as usual and let it set in the fridge. Then, repeat the process by applying your second color on the two bottom thirds of the cake. Let it set in the fridge and do it again for the darker color on the bottom third of the cake.
Gradient Summer Cake.
Difficulty Level: 3/5 (Intermediate)
You can also create a cake with the colors of a beautiful summer sunset.
A little guidance
To recreate this beautiful ombre/sunset buttercream, apply each color next to the other and blend the demarcations as much as possible with your spatula. Then, smooth your cake as you usually would. Keep blending and smoothing until you’re satisfied with the results.
Beach Cake
Difficulty Level: 3/5 (Intermediate)
If you want a more beach-like vibe you’ll love this cake design.
A little guidance
You can easily make your own summer-themed cake toppers and decorations using chocolate and silicon molds. You can also make edible sand.
Beach Cake.
Difficulty Level: 3,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
A little guidance
To make an even more realistic beach cake, don’t cut the rough edges of your cake and add touches of white buttercream on the edges using a palette knife to recreate this beautiful wave-like texture.
Pool Party Cake.
Summer Drip Cake.
Difficulty Level: 3,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
A little guidance
Drip cakes are also a really trending cake design these days. Use white chocolate ganache and food colorant to create your own as explained in this drip cake tutorial.
Summer Sunset Cake.
Difficulty Level: 3,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
If you want your cake design to look even more showstopping, you can paint beautiful landscapes on it.
A little guidance
You can easily learn how to paint on your cake. If you’re not confident enough use a stencil to get just as good of a result.
Elegant Tropical Cake.
Difficulty Level: 4/5 (High-Intermediate).
Maybe you want something more subtle while still having a summer vibe. In this case, you’ll love this elegant tropical cake.
A little guidance
When making tiered cakes, you have to pay extra attention to the structure of the cake. Always use a sturdy cake board for each tier and support the bottom tier with dowel rods or bubble tea straws cut to the height of the cake. Finally, you should ensure each tier is properly chilled and leveled before stacking them.
Under-The-Sea Cake.
Difficulty Level: 4,5/5 (High-Intermediate)
This cake design is the perfect opportunity to apply all the techniques described earlier.
A little guidance
Check out this tutorial to make sea-themed cake decorations and you’ll have the elements to recreate this kind of cake yourself.
Summer Cake Ideas For Advanced Bakers
These 4 summer cake ideas will be perfectly suited to experienced cake decorators.
3D Jelly Beach Cake.
Difficulty level: 5/5
Before you’re tempted to order this kind of cake make sure you actually like jelly cakes as the jelly makes a significant part of the cake.
Bluey Pool Party Cake.
Difficulty level: 5/5
With this kind of cake design you’ll be fine even if you’re not a fan of jelly, as it only takes a very small portion of the actual cake.
Painted Summer Cake.
Difficulty Level: 5/5
Maybe you want a cake that looks like an actual work of art.
Ocean Cake.
Difficulty Level: 5/5
If you’re in need of a bigger work of art than this cake will do just fine.
Girly Pool Party Cake.
Difficulty Level: 5/5
You can also opt for a girly summer cake idea, perfect for a kid’s summer birthday.
Tropical Flamingo Cake
Difficulty Level: 5/5
If you want a cake design that’ll amaze children and adults alike, this is the cake for you.
If you’re looking for more cake ideas, check out my other cake ideas for women or my cake ideas for girls.
Did you enjoy these summer cake inspirations? Sharing is caring! Pin this post to come back to it.
Please let me know in the comments if you’d like some specific cake ideas and/or tag me on Instagram @theperfectcakeidea. I’d also love to see your creations.
