Texture matters, and cake artists can do wonders with creative textures and toppings. As a prime example, buñuelos are a trending dessert, and Barry Callebaut’s Mark Seaman suggests crushing them up and using them to garnish a buttercream or ganache-covered cake for a crunch.

Flavor Right’s Garza points out the naked cake was big for a while in 2018, “but from what we hear is that more intricate cakes will see a big request in 2019.”

Rhonda Delaney at Lawrence Foods agrees that “yes, texture is very big. On the sides, we’re seeing it cut into the icing, or piped on. We are also still seeing rustic horizontal ribboning on the sides, especially beautiful when combined with gorgeous muted flowers on top.”

She also recommends creating different textures through crushed up foods. “Imperfect makes it perfect! Think broken chocolate, wafers, cookies, crumbs,” Delaney says.

Seaman offers another valuable idea to “use the downtime in January to make a stock of flowers for spring wedding and special occasion cakes. Peonies are most popular in white and pink and lily of the valley only grow with white blossoms.”

Shawna LeMott at Lucks suggests to “get bold icings with pre-mixed colors in premium gel or paste formats – you add fewer drops to get the same shocking hues.”