42 Pretty (and Delicious!) DIY Cakes for Any Occasion

Grab the mixer! These eye-catching treats are cause for celebration — and a photoshoot.

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August 23, 2019

By: Morgan Faulkner

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Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Heather Baird SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Clara MacLellan

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Heather Baird SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Rennai Hoefer

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Rennai Hoefer

Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Brandy Brown

Photo By: Heather Baird

Photo By: Heather Baird, SprinkleBakes.com

Photo By: Tomas Espinoza

Photo By: Sam Henderson

Photo By: Pretty Little Details

Photo By: Jalynn Baker

Photo By: Abigail Barnes

Photo By: Erin McCall Photography

Photo By: Ellen Foord

Photo By: Jalynn Baker

Monogram Cream Tart Cake

Monograms are highly favored on all kinds of party details and decor, but there’s none sweeter than a monogram cake! This modern version is made with layers of sponge cake and buttercream frosting decorated with edible flowers and sugar pearls. It’s a lovely focal point for any wedding, party or birthday celebration.

MAKE IT: How to Make a Pretty, Floral Monogram Cake

Lemon Elderflower Cake

Channel your inner royalty with a confection modeled after Harry & Meghan's wedding cake flavors. Full of bright, zesty and floral notes, this sweet treat is ideal for spring and summer parties, showers and weddings.

MAKE IT: Celebrate Like a Royal: Lemon Elderflower Cake Recipe

Coca-Cola & Peanut Butter Cupcakes

Chocolate cupcakes get a flavorful cola addition in this recipe while peanut butter frosting delivers a perfect sweet-and-salty bite.

MAKE IT: Coca-Cola Cupcake With Salted Peanut Butter Frosting Recipe

Dreamy Watercolor

Wow your guests with a beautiful, pastel watercolor cake. Three shades of buttercream are smoothly blended together to create a soft, dreamy effect. Feeling extra? Accent your masterpiece with sparkling geodes that complement the color scheme.

MAKE IT: 3 Trendy + Easy Ways to Dress Up a Plain White Wedding Cake

From: Heather Baird

Chocolate Cherry Dump Cake

For a quick and easy summer dessert that everyone will love, this chocolate cherry cake is the way to go. Why is it called a dump cake? Because you literally dump all the ingredients in the pan, then bake.

MAKE IT: Easy Summer Dessert Idea: Chocolate-Cherry Dump Cake

Carrot Cake Pops

For an easy-to-make treat or party favor, cake pops are the perfect go-to. Simply mold cake into the desired shape — carrots for this recipe — and dip in colored chocolate. Wrap the pops in cellophane bags and adorn with a pretty bow for gift-giving.

MAKE IT: Carrot Cake Truffle Pop Recipe

Zesty Lemon Cupcakes

Topped with a candied lemon and fresh mint sprigs, these brightly-flavored treats pack a sour punch thanks to a Lemoncello-infused buttercream.

MAKE IT: Lemon Cupcakes Recipe

From: Sam Henderson

Milestone Cream Tart Cake

There’s no better way to celebrate a milestone birthday or anniversary than with a delicious three-tiered dark chocolate cream tart cake. Each digit is made of three soft chocolate cookies filled with chocolate buttercream. The fun part is choosing all of the decorations to go on top!

MAKE IT: Celebrate Milestone Birthdays With a Decadent, Dark Chocolate Number Cake

Festive Multi-Flavor Cake

Can’t decide on just one flavor? You don’t have to! Each layer of this colorful cake is a different delicious flavor. Chocolate mousse, hummingbird cake, red velvet cake, sour cream vanilla cake and chocolate cake combine with cream cheese frosting for a scrumptious, one-of-a-kind dessert that will have all your guests impressed. GET THE RECIPE

Enchanting Rose Garden Cupcakes

No green thumb is required to bake up a batch of these adorable rose garden cupcakes. Delicious chocolate cupcakes topped with fudge icing and cookie crumbles serve as the potting soil while a handcrafted fondant rose rises out of the top of these adorable terra-cotta-pot treats.

Hummingbird Bundt Cake

Take a different approach to the standard tiered cake by baking it in a bundt pan instead. Brimming with ripe bananas and pineapple, this Southern staple is sure to be a crowd-pleaser.

MAKE IT: Hummingbird Bundt Cake Recipe

Pretty Piped Cupcakes

Adding a decorative touch to your desserts is now as easy as having a piping bag and piping tip. Learn four, beginner-friendly techniques with our pretty piping tutorial.

MAKE IT: Kitchen Crafts: How to Pipe the Prettiest Cupcakes

Decorative Honey Cupcakes

Topped with a rich chocolate "wax" seal, these honey-infused cupcakes are a bee-utiful addition to any dessert table.

MAKE IT: Poured Fondant Honey Cupcakes with Chocolate "Wax" Seals Recipe

Mini Rum Bundt Cakes

Celebrate the winter holidays any day of the year with miniature rum bundt cakes. A tasty aged-rum-and-butter glaze is brushed onto the fresh cakes while a cinnamon hard sauce and cranberries top the festive treats.

MAKE IT: Mini Rum Bundt Cakes With Butter-Rum Glaze

Pretty in Pink

A petit four is a small, bite-sized dessert ideal for any party theme or get-together. Here, pretty pink fondant is poured over delicious, raspberry-jam cake squares and embellished with a glittery fondant daisy.

MAKE IT: Poured Fondant Petit Fours Recipe

Lemon & Lavender Pound Cake

This fresh, zesty pound cake is sure to make a splash with your guests. Lemon juice adds an inviting tartness to the sweet icing while lavender grounds the overall flavor profile.

MAKE IT: Lemon Lavender Pound Cake Recipe

Crispy Rice Treat Cake With Chocolate Football Strawberries

Be the hit of your next tailgate with a delightfully-unconventional cereal treat cake dripping in chocolate-dipped strawberry footballs. Simply make crispy rice treats following the directions on the box, in three different-sized square pans. When cool, stack on top of one another, using chocolate buttercream as "glue" between the layers. To make the football strawberries, dip berries in melted chocolate, freeze, then draw on the "laces" with piped white chocolate.

MORE: 15 Totally Unique Ideas for Your Groom's Cake

Raspberry Rose Water Cake

Rose water is made from, you guessed it — roses. Its petals are steeped and used to add a hint of floral to sweets and treats. The smallest amount is added to this raspberry layer cake to enhance the fresh flavor of the berries. Cut this gorgeous, pastel cake open for a bright, raspberry surprise. GET THE RECIPE

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake

Calling all decadent dessert lovers! A chocolate chip cookie cake base is topped with marshmallow fluff, peanut butter frosting, caramel drizzle and a variety of candies.

MAKE IT: Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake

From: Heather Baird

Festive Unicorn Cream Tart Cake

Make any celebration truly magical with an enchanted unicorn cake. This yummy cream tart cake is made with layers of sponge cake and buttercream and decorated with bright, sweet embellishments for a truly enchanting party dessert.

MAKE IT: How to Make a Magical Unicorn Birthday Cake

Sprinkled With Love

Dress up any plain cake with a colorful array of eye-catching sprinkles. Use cardstock to make a cut out of your chosen shape, gently place on the cake and pack with sprinkles for an easy and quick cake topper.

Raspberry Bavarian Torte

English cakes and tortes are commonly made with classic genoise; a sponge cake that is made for soaking up flavorful syrups and liqueurs. It’s likely the foundation for Prince Andrew and Duchess Fergie’s 1986 five-foot-tall wedding cake soaked with rum, brandy and port. This Chambord-soaked version offers European flavor to the home baker. GET THE RECIPE

Cute Candy Corn Cakes

Fall's favorite candy gets reinterpreted as colorful mini cakes your Halloween or Thanksgiving guests are sure to love. The exposed cake layers mock the colors of the well-known treat while fluffy white frosting adds a sweet bite.

MAKE IT: Mini Candy-Corn Layer Cake Recipe

From: Kim Stoegbauer

Banana Pudding Cake

Who doesn’t love a good dessert mash-up? This cake consists of yellow sponge layers stacked with vanilla pudding and bananas. A fluffy covering of yellow buttercream and a row of vanilla wafers on top makes the inspiration unmistakable. Some of our other favorites dessert-cake mashups are tiramisu cake, and key lime pie cake.

MORE: 15 Totally Unique Ideas for Your Groom's Cake

Fruity Naked Cake

No need for inedible decor when fresh fruit is around. Seasonal berries, like strawberries, blackberries and blueberries, add a colorful array atop this layered naked cake.

MAKE IT: How to Make a Red, White and Blue Naked Cake

Rosy Buttercream Cake

Create a flower garden on your cake with sugar paste fondant. Learn how to make pretty petals and gorgeous greenery with our wedding cake tutorial.

MAKE IT: How to Make a Wedding Cake

Pumpkin Tiramisu Layer Cake

Crunchy amaretti cookies and rich mascarpone cream make up the delightful filling in this moist pumpkin spice layered cake. For extra sweetness, drizzle syrup on the cookies.

MAKE IT: Pumpkin Tiramisu Layer Cake Recipe

Rose Gold Royale

This three-tiered cake consists of a different decorating technique on each layer — stenciling on the bottom, painted sprinkles in the middle and sponged paint on top. A decadent choice for your next Gatsby-inspired event.

MAKE IT: 3 Trendy + Easy Ways to Dress Up a Plain White Wedding Cake

From: Heather Baird

Unicorn Cake Pops

These colorful cake pop cones will bring lots of magic and cuteness to your next party. They’re not hard to make, but you’ll need two specialty cake decorating items to make the sparkling unicorn horns. You can find edible gold paint and nontoxic edible glitter for purchase online and in the baking aisle at your local craft store.

MAKE IT: Whimsical Unicorn-Inspired Cake Pop Cone Recipe

Neapolitan Bonbon Cupcakes

For a cake that’s just as delicious as it is pretty, opt for a colorful treat topped with fancy chocolates. Strawberry, vanilla and chocolate flavors make up the yummy tastes in this eye-catching dessert.

MAKE IT: Neapolitan Bonbon Cupcakes Recipe

Lucky Vanilla Cupcakes

Feeling lucky? Instead of unpredictable food coloring, pulverized pistachios give this honey cream cheese frosting its brightly-colored, green hue.

MAKE IT: Lucky Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe

Mini Naked Cakes

You just can’t go wrong with a dessert that is not only adorable but also easy to make. These dainty cakes are the ideal after-dinner indulgence for your guests.

MAKE IT: How to Make Perfect Mini Naked Cakes

Pink Snowball Cakelettes

These bite-sized cakelettes are a miniature take on a childhood favorite. Mini cakes are dipped in pink-hued syrup and then rolled in coconut for a tropical, sweet treat.

MAKE IT: Pink Snowball Cakelettes Recipe

Scrumptious Chocolate Biscuit Cake

Not a baker? Not a problem! This chocolatey dessert requires no baking while still providing a rich and flavorful bite.

MAKE IT: Chocolate Biscuit Cake Recipe

Pretty Pastel Easter Treats

Let's be real — we all love a good Easter dessert no matter how old we are. Treat yourself to these delightful icing-covered cakes all year round by simply swapping the cookie cutter shape and icing color to fit your theme.

Top-Notch Glam Cake

Edible gold dust and feminine, rosy ruffles combine for top-notch wedding or sweet sixteen-party glam. GET THE TUTORIAL

Blue Velvet Cupcakes

A twist on the classic red velvet, these blue velvet cupcakes are perfect for baby showers, Fourth of July parties or any special shindig. Add a dash of violet food coloring into the red velvet recipe for the perfect hue of blue.

MAKE IT: Blue Velvet Cupcake Recipe

Hidden Sprinkle Surprise

Hidden sprinkle cakes are fastly becoming a popular trend in the dessert world. Not just for gender reveals anymore, remove the center section of cake and fill with desired colored sprinkles. Use the top portion of the piece you removed to cover the void and ice the cake as normal.

More Gender Reveal Ideas: 5 Genius Gender Reveals That Anyone Can DIY

Chocolate Stout Cake Pops

Beer and cake: a winning combination. A hardy stout beer is the secret ingredient in these festive, chocolate cake pops.

MAKE IT: Chocolate Stout Cake Pop Recipe

Southern Charmer

For the southern affair, you can't go wrong with a classic buttercream cake overflowing with blackberries and seeded eucalyptus. The plus side? This cake is just as delicious on the inside as it is pretty on the out.

MORE IDEAS: 58 Simple + Sweet Wedding Cakes and Desserts You Can Make Yourself

Rainbow Cake Delight

A rainbow layer cake looks complicated, have no fear, it's not anymore. Opt for colored icing instead of dyes, and you'll get the same look with less hassle.

DIY Bunny Cake

An adorable animal, tasty cake and coconut... what’s not to love about this easy Easter treat? Everybunny will be coming back for seconds — guaranteed!

MAKE IT: Hop Into Springtime With a DIY Bunny Cake

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