Wilton specializes in helping you make your celebrations memorable, so it stands to reason we know how to throw a party! We recently celebrated our 4,000,000th student by giving away 35 – $100 Wilton Gift Certificates and a free course at the Wilton School of Confectionary Arts in Darien, IL. In 2010 we are celebrating 35 years of Wilton Cake Decorating: teaching skills and touching lives!
As we begin this new decade and look back on the last 35 years, I would like to share the Wilton story. It begins during the depression era in the 1920s when Dewey McKinley Wilton, a proficient candy maker and pulled sugar artist, began teaching the sugar arts in exchange for cake decorating tips from German and French pastry chefs. This blossomed into a brilliant idea of teaching cake decorating as a job.
Wilton’s first class was advertised in Bakers’ Helper magazine in 1946. Seven students signed up for his two-week course taught at the exclusive “Wilton School of Decorating,” “headquartered” at his apartment complex on the south side of Chicago. The Wilton School was delightful…and the course was rigorous!
From those humble beginnings, courses in the Wilton Method of Cake Decorating began in 1975 at department, craft, and specialty stores. Because of the thousands of passionate and caring instructors who teach Wilton courses, four million students have learned to cake decorate using the Wilton Method.
2010 promises to be an exciting year for the Wilton Method of Cake decorating. With about five million people celebrating birthdays every week in the United States, there will be a lot of birthday cakes to bake and decorate. It has been a great 35 years. We thank you for letting us be a part of your family celebrations!
For more information on Wilton Method Classes in your area, please visit the Wilton Classes page. Learn more about becoming a Wilton Method Instructor!
Robin is a Senior Class Marketing Field Manager for the Wilton Educational Marketing Department. She started her career as a Wilton Method Instructor in 1989, joining the department as an employee in July of 1991. She has been involved in the development of Wilton Educational Marketing programs over the years, along with special projects.
Robin likes to think of herself as an artist before anything else. She loves to experiment with cake decorating products trying out new and challenging designs. She is also an avid reader, active in various forms of exercise and is involved in church ministries.