17 best cake-decorating classes in NYC for amateur bakers

The NY Cake Academy is New York City’s premiere bakery and cake decorating school. Founded by Joan Mansour, gold medal award winner by the Societe Culinaire Philanthropique and world-renowned cake decorator, the school has taught some of the most well-established cake decorators in the world, with work featured in Family Circle, Women's Day, and Martha Stewart Living. Decorators of all skill levels can take one-session workshop courses to practice or improve their technique or multi-week certification courses to become professional cake decorating experts. There are also numerous programs for children looking to learn how to blend art and baking, alongside a wide selection of themed courses to help prepare decorators looking to make cakes for a host of special occasions.

Learn the basics of cake decorating in this introductory course that will have you piping, sculpting and ruffling your buttercream into stunning works of edible art. You’ll spend time learning important techniques and designs (like piping shells, stars, zig-zag and rosettes), then you’ll put your new skills into action in a live cake decorating exercise. By the end of the course, you’ll have decorated your first cake (hopefully, first of many) and you’ll be ready to try your hand at more elaborate piping and designing challenges.

Combine comfort food with comfort television in these Home Cooking NYC classes that have participants recreate some of the classic dishes from the hit British baking program. In these classes, students will learn how to make dishes like a Victoria sandwich cake and a classic Swiss roll that would impress even Paul and Prue. Plus, once the lessons are over, not only will everyone have fresh baked desserts to bring home with them, but they will also leave with an additional recipe for a  lemon poppyseed drizzle cake to test their baking prowess in their home kitchens.

Grab a gift card for cake decorating classes to surprise the baker in your life with a hands-on learning experience. Instead of having to guess which tools or gadgets they need, this gift lets them jump into the fun of cake decorating by learning techniques like piping designs and working with fondant to create edible flowers. Cake decorating classes are perfect for turning their passion into polished skills, and the gift card gives them the freedom to focus on the parts of this tasty and creative medium they love most.

Learn how to use fondant, buttercream and other kinds of frosting to design cakes that are as much works of art as they are desserts. This course will teach you how to create cartoon-inspired cakes that look like they have been plucked off an animation cel and thrust in the 3D world. This course is a great option for anyone who is interested in the increasingly popular field of cake decorating and the creation of cakes that are art pieces as much as they are delicious baked goods.

Learning how to make cupcakes is a great skill to pick up if you are an aspiring baker, especially since it helps you get practice with smaller individual cakes. In this essential baking class, you’ll learn how to make a perfect, uniform cupcake that has the crumb structure and texture expected from professional bakers. This is the first part of a professional cake baking certificate program aimed at helping you learn how professional bakers ensure that everything they bake is delicious and uniform.

The pipe and the spatula are the essential tools of any master cake decorator. They are how you shape and distribute your cream, and without a firm knowledge of how to use these tools, you won’t stand a chance of winning any cake design contests (or just reaching your own personal cake decorating goals). In this class, you’ll work on essential piping and spatula techniques to set your foundations and get your feet grounded in the world of cake decorating.

NY Cake Academy offers a host of courses for kids to come in and learn the art of cake and cookie decorating. These classes are all themed around a time of the year (like fall or spring), a Holiday (like Christmas or Valentine’s Day), or just a general theme to help guide them (like dinosaurs or space). These classes are an easy and accessible way for young children to spend an afternoon getting to experience hands-on cookie and cake decorating activities, and they will get to leave with freshly decorated desserts to share and celebrate the occasion. You kids will love the chance to make beautiful works of edible art with their own hands and the chance to show-off their creations to the world.

While you may not think of it very often, the sides of a cake are as important to the overall presentation as the top. In this class, you’ll learn how to create designs and accents for the side of a cake, giving you additional opportunities to express your creativity in buttercream. This course focuses on making Swiss Meringue buttercream, creating layered cakes to produce visual effects, more advanced piping techniques and how to use turntables and spatulas to make the process easier. Learning how to craft the side of a cake is an essential part of the decorating process and this course will help guide you through the steps of making the perfect horizontal texture.

Drop flowers are a cake-decorating technique that involves creating stacks of buttercream flowers on the side of a cake, creating beautiful edible arrangements that can be personalized to your taste or needs. In this class, you’ll learn how these drop flowers are made and how you can create complex designs that won’t fall apart before you are ready to cut in. You’ll learn how to make buttercream for drop flowers and how to work with various Russian tip piping bags, which are specifically designed for this purpose. You’ll also learn how to blend buttercream together to create more complex visual effects in your cakes.

A recent development in the world of cake decorating, palette knife art involves using a specialized palette knife to smooth, blend and shape buttercream into impressive artistic designs. In this class, you’ll learn how to utilize this technique as a component of your cake decorating projects, and you’ll learn how palette knife art can complement more traditional cakes. You’ll learn how to make and blend colored buttercream, how to prepare the cake for the palette knife process and how to use piping bags and spatulas to complement your palette knife art.

One of the most impressive feats an early-stage cake decorator can master is creating life-like flowers as a part of their buttercream designs. In this class, which caps the buttercream essentials track, you’ll get hands-on experience making buttercream and learning how to use piping bags, couplers and tips and how to create 3d flowers and basket weave effects. You’ll also get more experience using a turn-table and making your own buttercream from scratch. With all of these skills in hand, you’ll be ready to start creating amazing buttercream designs and impressing all of your guests with these stunning cakes.

In the second part of the professional cake baking certificate program, you’ll learn how to create complex, delicious layer cakes that are as impressive to look at as they are delectable to eat. This program will teach you how to pre-plan your baking project and how to execute each step in the process, from baking and shaping the layers to preparing the frosting and buttercream that will be used to bring the layers together and decorate the outside of the cake.

Even if you have a specific dietary restriction, you probably still want to know how to make a cake that you can feel good eating. This course covers some of the most common alternate cake recipes, including dairy free-vegan cakes, gluten-free cakes and keto-friendly cakes. This practical baking class is ideal for anyone who wants to expand on their repertoire of different cakes or who have their own dietary restrictions but still want to make themselves some delicious specialty cakes.

If you are putting together a team-building activity at work, a fun event for a shower or bridal party or just an activity for a group of friends and family on a nice weekend, you should consider enrolling in a group cake decorating event. These events range from practical demonstration courses where you’ll learn professional cake decorating skills to laid back party style classes where you’ll spend an afternoon just messing around with cakes that you can show off at the end of the event.

If you are looking to spend time with your team learning a skill and becoming more adept at creative thinking and tactile artistic design, consider enrolling in this beginner group cake decorating event. In this course, a professional instructor will guide you through basic piping, spatula and coloring techniques that are used to create exquisite buttercream icing cakes. At the end of this course, everyone will have their own cake to take home with them or to share with their fellow participants as they marvel at each other’s creations.

If you are looking for a laid back, enjoyable holiday party for your team, consider this group gingerbread house party. In this course, you and your team will be given all of the time and supplies you need to make your own personalized gingerbread house creations. A host will introduce you to the process of crafting the exterior of the house and then let you be free to create as you enjoy one another’s company and a festive holiday atmosphere. Once the event runs to a close, you’ll be able to share your creation with the group and, if you would like, hold a quick contest judging on everything from creativity to skill to most comical looking house.