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I’m kind of obsessed with succulents. I love their tiny-ness. Their colors. The endless variety. The way they look all grouped together. So when I had two dozen cupcakes to decorate for my mother-in-law’s birthday, I was inspired. My mother-in-law likes succulents as much as I do, and unlike me, she has a green thumb for keeping them alive.

For me, succulents might be better crafted from frosting. It’s certainly more forgiving! If you’re a novice cake decorator like I am, this is a great project to test your skills out and get familiar with different cake decorator tips and techniques. I promise you can’t mess these up. Just create the three colors of frosting and experiment. Dots, dabs, swirls, petals, rosettes – use one or all of these and get creative. I frosted 24 cupcakes and no two were exactly the same.

The key to success? A really good buttercream frosting. Because if your frosting is delicious, no one really cares that much what the cupcakes look like anyway. Especially not your family. My white chocolate buttercream is my go-to for all cupcakes and cakes. The consistency is perfect for piping and the sweet flavor has a little more “oomph” than standard vanilla without being overpowering.

Start by baking 24 cupcakes from your favorite mix, or, if you’re really ambitious, from scratch. I’m not ambitious so a white cake mix it is! But I replicate a more homemade taste by substituting milk instead of water and melted butter instead of oil, plus an extra 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract thrown in for good measure.

Then grab your apron and let’s dive in.

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How to Pipe the Succulents

All of the succulents were created with just four Wilton cake decorator tips, all included with my favorite Wilton Dessert Decorator Pro Stainless Steel Cake Decorator Tool. I refer to this as my frosting gun because that’s basically what it is. It is easier and less messy than piping bags, and I like the control of the plunger to discharge the frosting just so. (Sorry, OCD perfectionist mom here.)

Star Tip

I started with the Wilton No. 4B Star Tip because it’s my favorite tip to use – the easiest in my opinion. This tip is very forgiving and lets you get a feel for how to use the frosting gun or piping bag. Just apply pressure to squeeze out frosting and then pull away to make the star. Repeat all over cupcake top in random arrangement.

To get the variegated coloring of these, use a frosting spatula or knife to make two “stripes” of purple frosting on opposite sites of the cake decorator tool canister or piping bag. Then make two “stripes” of blue frosting opposite the purple frosting. Fill the bag or canister with green frosting and pipe away.

For a different color variation, use just two opposite purple stripes and then fill the tube with mostly blue frosting, alternating with an occasional spoonful of green.

Open Star Tip

Once you’re feeling comfortable with the basic star tip, move along to the Wilton 1M Open Star Tip. This is a great one to experiment with while you have the purple-blue-green frosting combination left in the tube. To make the basic rosette, start from the center of the cupcake and pipe slowly and continuously while rotating the cupcake and working your way outward. Don’t worry if the frosting “line” breaks and isn’t perfectly continuous. This lends itself to the organic appearance of the succulents.

Next, experiment with using the open star tip in the same way you used the standard star tip, to make tiny individual stars all over the cupcake. For these, I switched up my frosting color, and put only two stripes of blue frosting on the inside of the piping tube, then filled the rest of the tube with the green frosting. Feel free to layer star on top of star to get that spiky appearance. If one of your stars doesn’t come out right, just pipe another one on top of it. This is freeform decorating that works.

Finally, combine the two techniques by making a tight swirl rosette in the center and then dot stars around the circumference, filling in all open space with more stars.

Round Tip

Next, grab a Wilton No. 230 Round Tip and get ready for some deliberate dotting. I used all light green for this one, but I didn’t empty out the piping tube first, allowing the leftover swirls of purple and blue to mix together and add that beautiful gradient color.

I worked from the outside in on this one, making dots side by side all around the cupcake, then starting the next inner row. As you work toward the center, layer the rows slightly on top of the outer row before it to build a bit of height at the middle. Creating this “type” of succulent is slow going but very easy. Just don’t rush it.

Petal Tip

The Wilton No. 125 Petal Tip has always intimidated me. It seems like frosting level Advanced rather than the Novice that I’m at. But something called the “Petal tip” would obviously be perfect for succulents so I reluctantly gave it a shot and did some experimenting to figure out a technique that worked for me.

I started with the basics and mimicked the same technique I had just used above with the Round Tip first. To get the coloration, I went back to the striping technique of two opposite purple stripes and two opposite blue stripes with a generous amount of frosting on each stripe, and then filling the tube with green.

Again, work your way from the outside in. Make “dots” with the petal tip, lifting straight up as you did with the round tip. Place the petal dots side by side as close together as possible. Once you complete the circumference, start on the next inner ring, slightly overlapping part of the first ring. When you get to the very center, focus on making a 5- or 6-pointed star to finish it.

You can see that as I went along and moved my way inward, I got lazier and started to make larger, wider petal dots to take up space and finish quicker. I actually like the finished effect that this gives!

The final cupcake was my magnum opus of succulents. Sticking with the petal tip, I wanted to create a rose-inspired succulent. To do this, I again started from the outside in (key for flowers and nature-inspired decorations!) Instead of doing dots, I applied continuous slow pressure as I moved the piping bag to form a wide teardrop shape (exactly like a flower petal, hence the tip name). I repeated this shape in a clockwise motion, slowly working my way inside. Unlike the previous techniques, this pattern was more of an ongoing swirl rather than discrete rings.

The possibilities for creation are endless. If you don’t like how one comes out, scrape the frosting off and start again. Experiment with different ways of adding the frosting to the piping tube to create different color combinations and patterns.

Once you’ve frosted them, sprinkle all the cupcakes lightly with Wilton Light Green Sugar Crystal Sprinkles for that sparkly, magical appearance. Store the finished cupcakes in the refrigerators so the frosting can harden. For best taste, remove from fridge about 20 minutes before serving so the frosting returns to room temperature.

There’s no wrong way to frost a succulent cupcake … and with this white chocolate buttercream frosting recipe, all of them will taste delicious.

I can’t wait to see the variations you come up with! Share your masterpieces with #NeverDoneWithFun.