Real or cake? Meet the American artist who can turn anything into a tasty treat.
Perfect: What is your earliest memory with baking?
Natalie Sideserf: So I'm actually not much of a baker as much as a decorator. I graduated from The Ohio State University with a degree in Fine Arts when shows like Cake Boss and Ace of Cakes were really popular. After a few weeks of experimenting with edible materials as a medium, I moved to Austin, Texas with my husband to pursue a career in the cake decorating industry. I got a job at a bakery in late-2011 for very little pay, but I was provided with an opportunity to really learn the tools and materials. I know I wouldn't be where I am today without that incredibly valuable experience.
Perfect: What lead you to create your first hyper-realistic cake? What was it?
Natalie Sideserf: I made a hyperrealistic cake bust of Willie Nelson for a cake competition in 2013 here in Austin. I remember trying to find reference images of other realistic bust cakes online but, at the time, I couldn't find any. I not only won several categories in the competition, but my brother posted an image of the cake to Reddit, where it reached #1 on the front page. A bunch of media outlets ran stories on the cake, and since it became such a viral moment, I decided to start Sideserf Cake Studio. While I've had several moments like that since then, there are still people today that tell me they found me through that Willie Nelson cake.
Perfect: What is the best surprise reaction you have got from cutting open one of your cakes?
Natalie Sideserf: My favorite reactions are when we make realistic cakes that blend in with other things around it, sort of like they're hidden in plain sight. The best one was probably when I made a cake of a mounted deer head for a birthday party held at a lodge. This lodge probably had about 50 deer heads mounted on the wall, so we replaced one of them with a deer head cake and for hours nobody noticed. It wasn't until the host said it was time to cut the cake and the crowd was ushered over to the deer cake and started cutting into it that they realized it wasn't actually a deer.
Perfect: What theme of cake is your favourite to make?
Natalie Sideserf: My strength is really in replicating organic items like people, animals, and other various household items. But things like buildings, motorcycles, computers -- anything that tends to be more clean and precise don't come as natural to me as organic items.
Perfect: What has been the most challenging cake you’ve made and why?
Natalie Sideserf: Bust cakes of specific people are always the most challenging for a few different reasons. Most importantly, it's incredibly more important to get the proportions right otherwise it will look like a completely different person. If I'm making a cake of a person that isn't specific and more generic, the process can be a little more forgiving since it doesn't have to look like a particular person. So when I'm making a cake of someone that everybody knows, I have to gather a ton of reference images from all different angles to make sure I get those proportions right.
Perfect: What is a key aspect when making a cake hyper-realistic?
Natalie Sideserf: Aside from making sure the suclpting proportions are correct, the painting is also incredibly important. In a human bust cake, capturing the right tones in eyes, hair, skin color, the mouth are key to making the cake look as realistic as possible. This is also true for any organic materials, because most things in nature aren't just a single solid color but are made up of many layers of different colors and shades.
Perfect: Is there anything you can’t turn into a cake??
Natalie Sideserf: I don't think so haha. Every time I'm at a store, I'll be looking around and suddenly start to zone out on different items thinking what I can turn into cake next. I'm always looking for a new challenge, so one of the things I tend to say on my YouTube channel is to subscribe because you never know what I'm going to make next. And that's because I don't even know!
