To celebrate my wonderful sister’s birthday, I was inspired by the Jamaica Observer’s newest and most brilliant foodie initiative Salut!, and chose to celebrate the occasion by dining in instead of going out, as we had been planning for weeks.

As a do-it-yourselfer, I’d normally do the cooking myself, but decided instead to leave that in the very capable hands of the brilliant young chef Christian Sweeney of Fuzion Food Service. I now only had to focus on decor and dessert. I used Arlene’s passion in fashion design to inspire the theme of the evening.

I created a luxurious fashion-designed look using our column Rock the Cloth as inspiration. Luxe silks and satins, pearls and beads, draped on a miniature dress form, created the backdrop for our fabulous fashion cupcakes and beautifully wrapped gifts. If you’re not much of a baker, fear not, there are so many places that do it well. You can buy the cupcakes you need and decorate them the way you want. To create these beautiful cupcakes you will need:

* Frosted cupcakes

* Fashion-inspired cutters or moulds

* Fondant in colours of your choice

* Pearls, gold and/silver dragees (like sprinkles)

* Fancy cupcake wrappers

You will then:

* Roll out fondant to 1/8-inch thick

* Press cutters into fondant to cut out desired shapes

* Let shapes dry/harden

* Decorate the cupcakes with the pearls/dragees

* Then top with your cut-outs/shapes

If you don’t own a cupcake tower, you can stack cake stands. If you do not have cake stands, you can invert a bowl and top it with a plate, then add another bowl and top that with another plate. To create the pyramid effect, a dinner plate or platter could be the bottom tier and a smaller breakfast plate or side plate could be placed at the top. And voila! your own stunning cupcake display.