A life-sized moving reindeer and the ‘world’s first walking unicorn’ are among the unique creations of a cake maker in Lincolnshire.
Hayley O’Beirnes, 36, originally launched Gadget Cakes in Birmingham around seven years ago, making structured and mechanical moving cakes to add a bit of theatrical performance to her creations.
Due to personal reasons she had to temporarily close the business and move away, but Hayley soon fell in love with Lincolnshire where she has lived for the last three years.
She relaunched Gadget Cakes in Gainsborough over the last 12 months, based on Highfield Close, with a combination of gadgets including gears, cogs and pullies, as well as different motors, being used depending on what sort of cake is needed.
Hayley O’Beirnes with her Rudolph cake. Photo: Firewood Film
The life-sized reindeer cake Hayley made for Cake International moves and can be fed carrots. Photo: Firewood Film
She is now hungry to spread her special cake making talent across Lincolnshire, and is also due to appear on Channel 5’s The Wonderful World of Cakes in April 2020.
Hayley makes her creations from the shed in her front garden, including Esme the walking unicorn, which she made for fun and the life-sized reindeer cake for Cake International in November.
She told Lincolnshire Reporter that she is known in the cake world as the ‘cake mechanic’.
One of Hayley’s Gold award winning cakes – a Labrador dog cake for Cake International.
Hayley said: “I want to be different. To me a cake has to not just look and taste nice, but also have a theatrical performance about it.
“When I had the dream of doing mechanical cakes, it has all been through trial and error, but I never dreamt I would make a life-sized mechanical reindeer cake that moved, but I did it.
“Gadget Cakes is all about doing the unbelievable and I feel blessed to see where it is now. When I did the reindeer cake at the Cake International show the kids loved that it was interactive and that they could feed him carrots. The looks on their faces made it all for me.”
The cakes normally have a minimum order of £100, but prices can vary as Hayley designs cake’s around her own and customer’s ideas.
Television work & cake creations
Although she was not able to disclose any specifics about the cake for the Channel 5 show, she said the experience was “full on” as a film crew followed her around filming for five days as she built the cake frame from start to finish.
The cake was later delivered to the Birmingham Children’s Hospital to a charity called Ronald McDonald House Charities, but you’ll have to wait until the Spring to find out what the cake is.
Among her other creations, since launching Gadget Cakes, are a tattoo cake with a working tattoo gun on it, a pouring vodka bottle cake, a moving dragon and a remote control car cake, which have mainly been made for individuals and charities.
She also featured on Channel 4’s Extreme Cake Makers in 2017 with an eight foot tall mechanical dragon cake.
Hayley teaches cake decorating part-time at the Cottingham Adult Learning Centre. She is also a featured artist at the Cake International Show and is training to be a judge there next year, as well as teaching more private classes in 2020.
A Deadpool cake was also among Hayley’s previous creations.
The work never stops and Hayley is currently working on a Minecraft cake and will be doing an Anime creation later this month. She also does a lot of walkthrough ‘how to’ make cakes and Hayley said this one almost went viral!
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