Geeky wedding cakes from Debbie Gillespie Cake Design

Debbie Gillespie Cake Design (formerly Farnley Fayre) was established in 2014 in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. Comprising of just its founder, Debbie Gillespie, the company aims to provide unique and innovative wedding cake designs for creative couples.

Inspiration for her designs are taken from her beautiful Yorkshire surroundings so woodland influences with natural textures and bold sugar florals feature heavily. There is also a strong use of art and sculpture, using watercolour-style handpainting, modelling and different stacking techniques to build alternative design ideas.

Debbie also has a naughty alter-ego and is a self-confirmed geek with a profound sense of fun. She is passionate in ensuring that the couple’s personality shines through and actively encourages clients to incorporate their pastimes, pets, interests etc into their design. She is not afraid to take on the wild and off-beat ideas that other more traditional cake makers will avoid. Thanks to her Harry Potter design, she was named by Yorkshire Life Magazine (June 2018) as one of the six best wedding cake designers in Yorkshire. Another design was featured on CBBC’s Marrying Mum and Dad in August 2018.

Her work is not lead by a desire to be Instagram-worthy – her mission is to make each customer feel special, have fun and experience the excitement and passion that she has for sugarcraft. Ultimately, it is not just a cake, it should be an experience!

Taste is particularly important and Debbie prefers to use a set of tried and tested traditional recipes e.g. lemon drizzle, sticky toffee etc which have been perfected over the years and appeal to everyone. She is also able to offer cater for gluten-free and vegan diets. Food safety is particularly important and for this reason she will not apply fresh flowers to cakes. Her premises are 5-star rated and her practices are fully food hygiene compliant.

Debbie is also very passionate about sustainability and supporting the local rural community. Her local dairy is less than 600yds away and provides all her butter, milk and creams in recyclable packaging (as well as the odd staff morale-boosting ice cream!). She also ensures that the rest of her ingredients including sugar, flour and preserves are UK-produced and where possible, from Yorkshire. Her company runs at 90% sustainability with the aim to become fully eco-friendly by the end of 2019.