Gerbera Flower
You will need:
Small Fine Brush
Method
Colour gum paste to desired shade. Or you can make it a bright orange. Gerbera flowers comes in a lot of bright pinks, oranges, yellows and reds. Dust work surface with cornstarch so that gum paste would not stick to it.Roll out the gum paste to as thin as you can manage.
Place the gum paste on top of the cutter and pass the rolling pin over it to cut it. I find that this way makes a cleaner cut than just rolling it and cutting it from there.
Use the palm of your hand and press it against the cutter to clean the edges better.
Invert it to the work surface, press the embosser down, then lift the cutter and push to release the gum paste.
Using a metal spatula, carefully lift it up and place on top of flower formers. Brush some gum glue in the middle of the flower. Repeat and make another one to place on top of the first. Gently press the flower in the middle. Prop up some of the petals by placing pieces of paper towels or cotton in between petals. Let dry.
Roll out the gum paste again and this time using the small daisy gum paste flower cutter, cut a few small daisies.
Using a scissor, cut each petal into two. Then cut the whole flower into half.
Using a fine brush, brush the insides of the flower with gum glue or water. Press in the small half daisies all around.
Repeat and make another row of small petals.
Take a small ball of a different color gum paste, in this one I used yellow, and press it against the metal sieve to create texture.
Place in the middle of the flower. Create more texture by making some more cut marks on the top. Dust the middle with some petal dust if desired. Let it dry for at least a day but more is better. This flower is a bit fragile because of all the petals. So, the longer the gum paste Gerbera flower dries, the better.
VARIATION
You can simplify this flower by skipping the step of making the small petals on the inner side of the flower. Just make the two sets of petals, then add the the textured center.
