By Rihaab Mowlana

The wafer paper was delicate, almost too delicate. One wrong brushstroke and it would tear, crumple, or worse, disintegrate into sugar dust. But night after night, surrounded by bowls of cornflour and with edible glue on her fingers, Chammarie Daniel wasn’t baking. She was designing.

A week later, at Noche Latina, her creations walked the runway. Not stitched. Not sewn. Baked. “They wanted me to do something with cake, or sugar flowers,” she says. “But I told them I’ll do edible clothes.” And just like that, Sri Lanka got its first taste of cake couture.

No Moodboard. No Manual. Just Madness and Magic.

When Colombo’s dance community came together to host Noche Latina, the goal was to celebrate talent both on and off the stage. Many showcased fashion, jewellery, or styling. Chammarie, a cake artist with over 13 years of experience running Savyscakes, had other ideas. “Honestly, it was designs I came up with on the go,” she says. “All I wanted was for them to look magical.” 

With no blueprint, no prior experience in edible fashion, and no real example to follow, she turned to the internet in search of inspiration and found nothing. “I scoured the internet to see if edible fashion of this kind, using this medium - outside of cake, of course - had ever been done before,” she says. “I didn’t find anything. This was the first time I even attempted making edible fabric,” she says. “Even for a cake.”

Her medium of choice was wafer paper, normally used for cake flowers or edible prints. But Chammarie didn’t want it to look like a gimmick. She wanted texture, movement, garment. “I made my clothes with something called edible fabric,” she explains. “It’s wafer paper converted using two simple ingredients that, when brushed over, make it soft and pliable, with a velvety texture… like fabric.”

The pressure was real. “Since this was the first time I was doing it, I didn’t want to start too early as I wasn’t sure how long it could be kept for,” she says. “And wafer paper is very expensive, so I didn’t want to misuse the ones I had already purchased.”

Instead, she dove headfirst into a week of non-stop trial and error. “It took me a little more than a week of long, LONG hours and a few sleepless nights. I was awed every time I got something right, that I used to stare at it, mesmerised.”

It wasn’t always graceful. “This process requires the use of A LOT of corn flour,” she adds. “So I was covered from head to toe in corn flour. Every time my mom saw me, she thought I was losing my mind.”

Accessories? Fully Baked.

The looks didn’t stop at dresses. Each outfit came with its own edible handbag, entirely made of cake. “I looooved creating those handbags,” Chammarie says. “Well, I can’t give out trade secrets, but what I can say is that for the handbags to hold up like that, the inner structure has to hold strong. Making standing cakes or gravity-defying cakes, simple physics and mechanics come into play.”

Once again, detail mattered. “Wafer paper is white, so they had to be coloured in with edible dusts and gel colours to give them those vibrant colours. And I was very specific about how I wanted them to look, so it took a while to colour them in.”

Word spread quickly backstage. There was edible fashion in the show. But no one really believed it until they saw it. “The models were thrilled!” she says. “They couldn’t believe the clothes were actually edible. Even their accessories were edible. Some of the other models were disappointed that they couldn’t wear edible clothes on the runway.”

And the audience? “I got amazing feedback,” she says. “I was thrilled at their ‘WOW’ expressions. I distributed the handbag cakes to the audience after the show, so they got a look and taste of my creativity too.”

A One-Off? Absolutely Not.

For Chammarie, this wasn’t a moment of madness. It was the start of something. “I would LOVE to do it again!” she says. “My mind is blown with the possibility of things I can do. I’ve already designed new clothes and handbags, and I’m even thinking about hats and shoes.”

If time and budget weren’t an issue? “A wedding dress”.

There wasn’t a grand, stitched-in message behind it all. But maybe that’s the point. “I did want to showcase my creativity and wanted people near and far to know of it,” she says. “And also to show that there are limitless possibilities of what you can do with edible medium if you just put your mind to it. I guess it works for everything else in life, too.”

“I like to create art in every form,” she says. “I’m an out-of-the-box thinker when it comes to cakes, and I love it when clients give me creative freedom. I don’t like being limited, and I believe my creativity flows limitlessly. I think my personality resonates with that too.”

Although she comes from a baking background, design and sculpting were entirely self-taught. “I’ve designed my own outfits at some point in my life - as most women do - but this kind of designing is definitely new to me,” she says. “I self-taught everything I know, through watching videos on YouTube.”

She sees her work as a blend of structure and story. “I’m a self-taught sculptor and cake artist, shaped by trial, error, experimentation, and a whole lot of practice. There’s a philosophy behind what I do: creativity isn’t just copying; it’s interpreting, personalising, and pushing boundaries.”

Art That Melts, and Still Matters

“I wish more people understood that edible art is more than just food,” she says. “It’s craftsmanship, patience, and storytelling. Every figurine, flower, or sculpted detail takes hours of planning, layering, and fine handwork, just like any other art form.”

But the most powerful part? “It’s temporary; it’s meant to be admired, celebrated, and then shared as part of a joyful moment. That’s what makes it magical”.

She’s been doubted before. Underestimated by those who couldn’t quite see the scale of her imagination. “Yes, a few times,” she says. “That happens in my field - or in any field really - when people can’t wrap their minds around your creative level and your capabilities.” But she doesn’t mind. “I’ve proved them wrong. Every single time. So I have no qualms”.

On that night, while others worked with tulle, beads, and silk, Chammarie worked with science, sugar, and sleeplessness. And the runway didn’t just shimmer. It cracked. It crunched. And, if you were lucky, it melted on your tongue.