Waitrose has become the first British supermarket to offer a hand-decorated Lambeth-style cake, capitalising on a 75 per cent increase in website searches for the vintage design this year.
The elaborate confection reflects a broader social media phenomenon, with Instagram featuring more than 114,000 posts tagged #retrocake and TikTok recording 225,000 searches for Lambeth cakes.
The £65 creation revives a decorating technique from the 1930s, characterised by ornate piping and exceptional detail.
It features three tiers of golden sponge filled with Sicilian lemon buttercream and dual layers of Tiptree raspberry jam.
Each cake requires more than seven hours of meticulous handwork and serves between 32 and 34 people, making it suitable for significant celebrations.
The supermarket has collaborated with celebrated baker Fiona Cairns, whose prestigious portfolio includes creating the wedding cake for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (now Prince and Princess of Wales) in 2011.
Cairns has since crafted confections for royal christenings and Lady Gabriella Windsor's 2019 wedding.
Most recently, the Fiona Cairns team made a cake "fit for the King" to celebrate 40 years of The King's Fund (formerly The Prince's Fund).
'There's something magical about seeing a plain sponge turn into an elegant centrepiece'
|Waitrose
The partnership between Waitrose and Fiona Cairns dates back to 1993, when the bakery began supplying just six celebration cakes to the retailer.
Nowadays, the supermarket stocks several Fiona Cairns creations, including the Golden Sponge Pink Boutique Cake, Lemon Daisy Cake, and Seasonal Fairy Cakes.
Her team now produces this labour-intensive Lambeth cake exclusively for Waitrose, with customers able to add personalised messages of up to 25 characters to their orders.
Cake technologist Chandra Lalit, who has spent more than 11 years with the Fiona Cairns team, leads the decoration of these intricate designs. Her expertise is essential for mastering the precise piping techniques required for the vintage style.
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'The piping on this particular cake is incredibly intricate'
|Waitrose
"The piping on this particular cake is incredibly intricate, and it's taken a little while (and a lot of patience!) to master the steadiness and control it needs," Chandra stated.
"What I love most about decorating cakes like this is how much joy and beauty they bring. There's something magical about seeing a plain sponge turn into an elegant centrepiece."
Waitrose product developer Simona Cohen-Vida revealed the Lambeth cake underwent nearly a year of development, requiring three design iterations to perfect the piping technique.
She added: "We're over the moon with the finished product and hope that customers will be as blown away by the quality, taste, and value as we are."
Waitrose trend innovation manager, Emilie Wolfman, noted that the cake's "retro aesthetic and lavish appeal" captures the social media zeitgeist while delivering "a serious wow factor" for special occasions.
This cake is just one of eight new and exciting launches to the celebration cake section of the website this month.
"With an injection of newness to reinvigorate the range, customers can find something to suit every occasion and style," the supermarket promised shoppers.
In other Waitrose news, foodies are "obsessed" with a 2025 summer collection.