Giant palace wedding cake was surreal to make says baker

Sam Woodruff said creating this cake was a "surreal moment"

A professional baker said it felt like she had gone full circle after she created a 13ft tall (3.9m) "palace" cake with towers, LED lights and dozens of silk flowers.

Sam Woodruff created the £13,000 showstopper for a couple who married at The Savoy on the Strand in London.

She started her career working as a chef near the same hotel.

The 48-year-old, from Grays in Essex, said the cake cost more than her annual wages when she worked in the capital.

"The only way to describe it is as a palace," said Ms Woodruff, who said returning to The Savoy with the cake was a "surreal moment".

She started building the cake at the start of November and the bride, Madeline Burton, 18, married her husband in January.

The baker said she started making the cake in November and the wedding was in January

Ms Woodruff said she built a similar cake for a couple in Ireland, after the pair saw a picture of Ms Burton's version.

The original cake featured intricate renaissance portraits and 3D-printed towers, and the baker said she used 50kg of icing.

"It takes so much time. I was functioning on four to five hours of sleep when it was coming up to the wedding," Ms Woodruff told BBC Essex.

"The adrenaline rush when you are building it, when everyone is coming to see it and taking photographs of it, it is so lovely and rewarding."

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