Archie's Retro Train Party Dessert Table

Gerri's son, Archie, turned two at the beginning of October, so we celebrated with a Retro Train Party. We are buzzing after having our dessert table featured by one of our absolute favourite international event stylists, Amy Atlas. Click here to see the feature on her blog, and here for the feature on her Facebook page.

Retro Train Party dessert table
Concept, design, styling & stationery - Little Birdie Events

Archie loves trains, which inspired us to create this train party with a fun, wholesome, and fresh, yet retro vibe. We loved working with our colour palette of slate blue, powder blue, apple green, and mid-grey. We also pulled in wood-grain and light bright tones to off-set the gorgeous preppy colours and patterns of spots and stripes.

If you have been a reader of our blog and follower of our work, you would know that we prefer not to work too literally with a theme, so we set about creating a dessert table fit for a little boy with added train touches and a retro feel.

We put a great deal of love and fun into putting this event and dessert table together, and we are so happy to be able to share the details with you. We have included vendor credits throughout and at the end of this post.

We are so grateful to our terrific suppliers. We adore working with you, Judy from Cakes by Judy C, Trish from Marche du Macaron, Rosie from Jocelyn's Provisions, and Lily from Sticky, Chouquette, Flour & Chocolate, and Gwen from Welsh Lady. Thank you also to Samantha from Dunne with Style for your wonderful style and crafty work.

Read on for the details and photos...

{Invitation}

We created this simple, yet stylish and fun invitation, which introduced the colour palette, theme, and wholesome boyish retro atmosphere of the event.

Stationery by Little Birdie Events

{Backdrop}

Samantha from Dunne with Style created rosette fans out of card stock in our chosen colours and patterns in line with the fresh, wholesome retro feel we had in mind. She also created a rosette fan name garland on bunting using vintage-style paper fans (similar to those we had made for Isabella's Wonderland {very merry} Mad Hatter Tea Party - click here to check it out).

We selected the light-toned brick wall as the location for the table, knowing it would tie in to the theme wonderfully. We love the striking backdrop for the dessert table.

Rosette fans and name garland by Dunne with Style

Rosette fans by Dunne with Style

Rosette fans and name garland by Dunne with Style

{Food}

We had such fun designing some neat and scrumptious sweet treats with our wonderful suppliers to coordinate with the young boyish, preppy Retro Train Party theme.

Once again we came together with Trish from Marche du Macaron to create some macaron magic! These were some of our favourite items on the dessert table. We selected six of Marche's usual menu flavours that represented six traditional style "Soda Pop" or "Milk Bar" drinks that may have been used as refreshments on a train:

• Ginger Beer (one of Marche's current limited-editino "Spring Picnic" macarons)
• Traditional Lemonade (Marche's "citrus lemon" macaron)
• Creaming Soda (Marche's "vanilla bean" macaron)
• Chocolate Milk (another one of Marche's current limited-edition "Spring Picnic" macarons)
• Strawberry Milkshake (Marche's "mixed berry" macaron)
• Iced Coffee (Marche's "espresso" macaron)

Macarons by Marche du Macaron
Concept, design, styling & stationery by Little Birdie Events

Macarons by Marche du Macaron
Concept, design, styling & stationery by Little Birdie Events

The decoration of each macaron was so eye-catching and fabulous (and yummy) - how cool are the chocolate squiggles, the gorgeous candied lemon peel and ginger pieces, and the tangy dried slices of strawberry! We just adore working with Trish - she is so passionate about bringing our ideas to life.

Macarons by Marche du Macaron
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Caramel Bomb cupcakes are one of Judy C's specialties - a delicious, fluffy cupcake with a surprise caramel centre. One of our favourites. Yum!

Cupcakes by Cakes by Judy C
Stationery by Little Birdie Events

Peanut butter whoopie pies are another one of Judy C's specialties. Delicious, soft peanut biscuits sandwiched with peanut butter cream.

Whoopie pies by Cakes by Judy C
Stationery by Little Birdie Events

Meringues (made by Jocelyn's Provisions) and Ferrero Raffaello balls appeared as little puffs of smoke. These were displayed above mini vanilla bean cupcakes made by Flour & Chocolate.

Meringues by Jocelyn's Provisions
Mini cupcakes by Flour & Chocolate
Stationery by Little Birdie Events

Mini cupcakes by Flour & Chocolate
Stationery by Little Birdie Events

Petit four eclairs filled with chocolate, vanilla, and coffee custards made by Chouquette were some other tasty morsels featured on the table.

Eclairs by Chouquette
Stationery by Little Birdie Events

"Railroad Slices" consisted of three slices from Jocelyn's Provisions, cut into haphazard pieces and placed atop black chocolate beans to look like a railroad. The decadent slices included chocolate & raisin, triple chocolate, and (our favourite) chocolate, caramel & pecan.

Slices by Jocelyn's Provisions

Classic vanilla biscuits were decorated with apple green spots, slate blue stripes, and two different edible images with motifs, which we created to tie in with the stationery suite - "Archie Express" and "Stop No. 2". Made by Cakes by Judy C.

Biscuits by Cakes by Judy C
Stationery by Little Birdie Events

Six white dishes on top of a long wood-grain riser with six grey-striped rosette fan wheels reminiscent a train carried cargo, including chocolate-covered honeycomb, Ferrero Rocher balls, and a range of delicious Darrell Lea sweets - "Caramel Snows", licorice bites, pieces of rocky road, and chocolate-covered peanut brittle.

Rosette fans by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Rosette fans by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

"First Class Ticket" Whittaker Peanut Slabs were covered in personalised stickers coordinated with the stationery suite we created.

Whittaker Peanut Slabs
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Kiwifruit-flavoured green-and-blue lollipops were designed and created by Sticky especially for the birthday boy, Archie. These had "Thank You" notes tied to them with different styled ribbons, and were displayed in wooden plantar boxes.

Lollipops by Sticky
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Chocolate mint balls and apple-flavoured bon bons were displayed in apothecary jars, as were a selection of fresh apples and pears, as well as gorgeous black fabric poms to depict coal and fluffy grey fabric and tulle poms to depict puffs of smoke, made by Samantha from Dunne with Style.

Like the macaron "Refreshment Bar", there was a savoury snack bar, with small pine cups holding "boy snacks" - Kettle corn, mini pretzels, and roasted salted nuts.

Mini pretzels, roasted and salted nuts, and kettle corn in mini cups
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

The beautiful dessert-style "Ultimate Chocolate Roulade" was made by Gwen from Welsh Lady. We wanted to use a cake that was a bit different, and that depicted a log that may be cargo on a train.

Cake by Welsh Lady
Poms by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Cake by Welsh Lady
Rosette fan by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

{Drinks}

We had a small drink station serving iced water and lemon iced tea from eco-glass drinks dispensers.

Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Mini glass bottles were dressed with "neck ties" of ribbon coordinated with the colour palette and patterns consistent with the styling, as well as fun retro-style paper straws.

Concept, design, and styling by Little Birdie Events

{Details}

We love creating little details that make each event special in its own way. For Archie's party we designed and created the stationery suite ourselves using a cute train in slate blue, and text, fonts, and colours in line with the retro theme.

Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Mini glass bottles representing the "Refreshment Bar" macarons in flavours reminiscent of traditional "Soda Pop" and "Milk Bar" drinks.
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

White dishes ready to carry "cargo" atop a wood-grain "train" with rosette fan "wheels".
Rosette fans by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Whittaker Peanut Slabs covered in "First Class Ticket to board the Archie Express" stickers
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Welcome sign before entering the "train yard"
Rosette fans by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

{Photography}

The Little Birdie girls have recently purchased an SLR camera and have been dabbling in simple photography. We've had a lot of fun experimenting with the camera and trying to capture the details of our work.

Macarons by Marche du Macaron
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Lollipops by Sticky
Macarons by Marche du Macaron
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Eclairs by Chouquette, biscuits by Cakes by Judy C, slices by Jocelyn's Provisions, cake by Welsh Lady
Rosette fans by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Rosette fans by Dunne with Style
Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

Concept, design, styling, and stationery by Little Birdie Events

{Vendor Details}

Concept, design, styling - Little Birdie Events
Stationery - Little Birdie Events
Sweets: Cakes by Judy C, Marche du Macaron, Jocelyn's Provisions, Sticky, Chouquette, Flour & Chocolate, Darrell Lea

Rosette fans, name garland, poms: Dunne with Style

Cake: Welsh Lady

Photography: Little Birdie Events

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Check out our Facebook page for more photographs of Archie's Retro Train Party.

Just one week after Archie's party we created a Ladybird Garden-themed dessert table for Gracie, a little girl who turned one. We will be sharing images of this event soon.

Carole & Gerri

Wonderland {very merry} Mad Hatter Tea Party Dessert Table

We are thrilled once again to have one of our dessert tables featured on the blog of the inspiring event stylist, Amy Atlas. Click here to have a look. We are also delighted to have also been featured by Louisa on the Little Big Company's blog. Click here to view the feature.

We styled this party for Isabella, a little girl who turned one last month.

Isabella loves hats, which inspired us to create this {very merry} Mad Hatter Tea Party with a young, soft, feminine vibe. We were aware that Alice in Wonderland is a popular theme, so we focused on adding some different touches by channeling a vintage feel with a gorgeous pastel colour palette, and by focusing on the small but special details, including the stationery for the table. We loved working with blush pink, baby blue, mint green, pastel yellow, and soft violet.

As we prefer not to work too literally with a theme, we set about creating two pretty pastel vintage-Alice-style dessert and candy tables with added touches from the Alice in Wonderland story and Mad Hatter by-line.

We had a fabulous time putting these together, and we are so pleased to be able to share the details with you. We have included vendor credits throughout and at the end of the post.

As always, we loved working with our fantastic suppliers to create gorgeously coordinated sweet treats for the dessert tables. Thank you to Judy from Cakes by Judy C, Trish from Marche du Macaron, Rosie from Jocelyn's Provisions, and Lily from Sticky. We also love the delicious dessert-style cake made by Gwen from Welsh Lady. Thank you also to Samantha from Dunne with Style for the wonderful craft work we used for the backdrop, and Emma from E. V. O'Neill Photography for capturing the table and details so beautifully.

Read on for the details and photos.

The Little Birdie girls setting up the Wonderland {very merry} Mad Hatter Tea Party dessert table for Isabella

Samantha from Dunne with Style created rosette fans for us out of cardstock in colours and patterns in line with the young, feminine pastel colour palette we put together for this event. She also created a rosette fan name garland using vintage-style paper fans. We love this beautiful and eye-catching backdrop for the main table.

The setting for the table was perfect. It was on the verandah of a beautiful “Old Queenslander” home in a green Alice-in-Wonderland-esque garden against a glorious Brisbane spring-blue sky.

 

Mad Hatter {very merry} Mad Hatter Tea Party dessert table
Concept, design & styling - Little Birdie Events
Stationery - Little Birdie Events
Rosette fans and name garland - Dunne with Style

We designed some beautiful and delicious sweet treats with our fabulous suppliers to coordinate with the Wonderland {very merry} Mad Hatter Tea Party vibe.

We collaborated with Trish from Marche du Macaron to create some of our favourite items on the dessert table, the macarons. We wanted to use the macarons as a medium to create the famous “Eat Me”, “Try Me”, “Take One” cakes/biscuits eaten by Alice. We also wanted to create some fun “Mad Hatter” macarons with interesting flavour combinations. We imagined, and Marche du Macaron created!

Strawberry & marshmallow, blueberry & orange blossom, and lemon & white chocolate macarons by Marche du Macaron

Rose & lychee, and violet & vanilla bean macarons by Marche du Macaron

Lavender & earl grey, and salted caramel macarons by Marche du Macaron

Very un-vanilla cupcakes were, as the name suggests, not just vanilla cupcakes! They were filled with either a surprise lemon curd or strawberry crème filling, but disguised as a plain vanilla cupcake, and decorated with lovely coloured hearts.

Cupcakes - Cakes by Judy C 

Macarons - Marche du Macaron
Cupcakes - Cakes by Judy C
Slices - Jocelyn's Provisions

Petite blossom cupcakes – very pretty little New York vanilla cupcakes adorned with buttercream and sweet pastel blossoms inspired by Alice’s time in the Wonderland garden.

Petite cupcakes - Cakes by Judy C

The Queen of Hearts’ raspberry jam tarts inspired by those stolen from the Queen by the cheeky Knave of Hearts.

Raspberry jam tarts - Cakes by Judy C

Playing card biscuits decorated classic vanilla biscuits were inspired by the Queen of Hearts’ playing card guards, though in keeping with the soft, young, pastel colour palette.

Decorated classic vanilla biscuits - Cakes by Judy C

Vintage hat decorated classic vanilla biscuits were a must-have for Isabella, as she loves hats. We designed these using the image of the vintage Mad Hatter’s hat.

Decorated classic vanilla biscuits - Cakes by Judy C

Squares of blonde brownies and chocolate, caramel & pecan slice were combined to portray a chessboard, an important feature in the Alice in Wonderland theme.

Blonde brownies and chocolate, pecan & caramel slices - Jocelyn's Provisions

Meringues - Jocelyn's Provisions

Lemonade crystal swizzle sticks from were displayed in a tea set.

We created an additional candy table to be paired with the main dessert table.

Wonderland Mad Hatter Tea Party candy table.
Concept, design & styling - Little Birdie Events
Stationery - Little Birdie Events

Displayed on the candy table were…

Rose-flavoured pink and violet heart-shaped lollipops designed and created especially for the birthday girl, Isabella, by (link) Sticky.

Lollipops - Sticky

Couture couverture painted chocolate tiles with various interesting flavours.

Mini glass bottles with small floral-flavoured sweets and our own “Drink Me” labels.

Concept, design & styling - Little Birdie Events
Stationery - Little Birdie Events

Delicious smooth flowing caramel-filled mushroom-shaped chocolates.

Sweets featuring some of the enjoyed by Alice while drinking the “Drink Me” drink – cherry bon bons, custard bon bons, pineapple clouds, and toffee bon bons (for obvious reasons, we omitted the roast turkey and hot-buttered toast flavours!).

Pineapple clouds, toffee bon bons, cherry bon bons, ice cream cones, rhubarbe & costard bon bons, pink chocolate hearts

Lindt chocolate bars covered in beautiful paper with a personalised sticker, which we created to coordinate with the stationery suite we created for the tables.

Stationery - Little Birdie Events

The beautiful dessert-style cake was made by Gwen from Welsh Lady.

Dessert cake - Welsh Lady

We do enjoy creating details special to each event. For this event we designed and created the stationery using the harlequin pattern in pastel colours as the background and fonts and motives to create a pretty, feminine vintage feel.

We selected some of our favourite excerpts from Alice in Wonderland to feature on the table, including:

Concept, design & styling - Little Birdie Events
Stationery - Little Birdie Events
Raspberry jam tarts, petite cupcakes, decorated biscuits - Cakes by Judy C

Vendor Details:

Concept, design, styling, and stationery: Little Birdie Events 

Sweets: Cakes by Judy C, Jocelyn's Provisions, Marche du Macaron, Sticky

Rosette fans and name garland: Dunne with Style

Cake: Welsh Lady

Photography: E. V. O'Neill Photography

Less than one month after creating these tables for Isabella we were at it again putting together a fantastic Retro Train party dessert table for Gerri’s son, Archie, who turned two this week. Stay tuned!

Carole & Gerri