It started with an invitation – to create a birthday cake to mark our 30 years in print, as celebrated in the October 2026 issue of Wallpaper* – sent to visionaries from across the creative industries that represent Wallpaper’s universe. Those that responded included architects, fashion designers, artists, image-makers, chefs, jewellers and furniture designers, all of whom have helped define our first three decades, and who continue to inspire, excite and shape the present and future of their industries. Among them are former Design Awards judges and winners – including Patricia Urquiola, Jon Gray (Ghetto Gastro), Nifemi Marcus Bello (Nmbello Studio) and Objects of Common Interest – alongside many of the creatives who have appeared on our pages over the years, and whose stories we have been proud to tell.
We were ecstatic with the response. Over the course of several weeks, cakes in all shapes and forms flooded our inboxes – both virtual and physical. They came in the form of drawings, objects, photographs and even real, edible cakes. Some ‘bakers’ invited other creatives to join them in the making of their cakes, leading to an ever-expanding constellation of creativity that made this celebration a perfect fit for our first 30 years. Happy birthday to us – now tuck in…
Issey Miyake
The cake from Issey Miyake nods to the brand’s ‘Paper Log’ concept, exploring the potential of paper as a three-dimensional material
Bas Smets
A Wallpaper* landscape cake, from landscape architect Bas Smets, who describes it as a ‘sketch of a “layer cake” where the layers are earth/soil strata and the candles are trees’.
Patricia Urquiola
Colour and form combine deliciously in signature Studio Urquiola style
Dior
A sketch from Dior creative director Jonathan Anderson
ESTÚDIO CAMPANA
Cake Estúdio Campana-style
Gucci
Gucci’s cake comes with a recipe card
Lina Ghotmeh
Lina Ghotmeh – Architecture conceived a white paper composition formed by the interlocking of the Wallpaper* asterisk. ‘The 30 upper points of its branches pay tribute to the magazine's 30-year journey,’ says the studio. ‘Revealed through the interplay of light and shadow, the piece unfolds as an exploration of presence and absence. In its essentiality, the white paper becomes a vessel for light, allowing space, void, and perception to shape the work as profoundly as the material itself.’
Marchesi 1824
With a decorative motif incorporating the Wallpaper* asterisk, this edible cake was led by Diego Crosara, pastry art director and product manager at Marchesi 1824, the renowned Milanese pastry shop that's part of the Prada Group
Ma Yansong
The cake created by Ma Yansong, architect and founder of MAD Architects, ‘draws inspiration from his early work Fish Tank. It translates his critical thinking of "observing humanity through fish and framing space via the fish tank" into a tribute to Wallpaper’s 30th anniversary,’ states the team.
‘The glass of a fish tank acts both as a barrier and a viewing window, mirroring the magazine’s media identity over the past three decades. Like a transparent medium, it stands apart from mundane ordinariness, continuously embracing avant-garde architectural, artistic and design ideologies from across the globe within, while presenting the public with an aesthetic realm that is free, soft and unshackled by rigid norms.’
Objects of Common Interest
A work of art from Objects of Common Interest
Norman Foster
A birthday wishes sketch from Norman Foster, founder and executive chairman of Foster + Partners
Rick Owens
From Rick Owens, a metal sculpture
Tosin Oshinowo
‘Three tiers for 30 cheers! Happy 30th birthday Wallpaper*,’ says Oshinowo Studio, the architecture and design practice founded by Tosin Oshinowo. Its monochromatic sculptural cake ‘references and celebrates the iconography, scarification, and patterning traditions of the Mulwi, Edo, and Yoruba peoples of Africa. Conceived as both an edible artefact and a sculptural object, the cake explores geometry, texture, repetition, and material expression through a refined contemporary language of form. The intention was not to reference a single culture, but rather to celebrate the richness, diversity, and spatial sophistication of visual traditions across the continent.’ The team continue: ‘The cake is crowned with Wallpaper’s asterisk, rendered as a sculptural topper that serves as the final gesture in the composition – a marker of celebration, cultural influence, and editorial innovation.
‘The base tier combines chocolate chip, marble, and white chocolate flavours; the middle tier is vanilla and strawberry; while the top tier is rich chocolate cake. The photoshoot theme is a tropical rainforest twist!
‘Conceived by Tosin Oshinowo and Oshinowo Studio, the project is a collaboration with Kelly Omodamwen, a talented sculptor working across multiple mediums, and award-winning pastry chef Olivia Okeke.’
Kim Gordon
Kim Gordon smokes a birthday candle for Wallpaper*
Faye Toogood
A painted canvas sculpture from Faye Toogood
Hannah Martin
‘[There’s] a lot of personal HM stuff in there,’ says jewellery designer Hannah Martin, ‘my absolute favourite plate from home, the pin is a photocopy of my own earring I wear everyday and the flower/flour is the white rose of Yorkshire! All my favourite things to celebrate my favourite magazine.’
Georg Jensen
Georg Jensen says it in silver, with a cake server by Arno Malinowski, 1930
Completedworks
From Completedworks, a cake made from clay and freshwater pearls
Nmbello Studio
Nmbello Studio cooks up a render
Massimo Vitali
A rock cake? Photographer Massimo Vitali shot his cake on the Vaschine coast near Livorno, Tuscany
Samuel Ross
A drawing and writing from Samuel Ross. The prose reads: Enrichd IdeasLucid, Slow formingCakes congregateCelebrate, bindImbue!
Isabel + Helen
Stacks and stacks of cake from Isabel + Helen
We Are Ona
We Are Ona, the ‘creative culinary movement’ made us an Italian tiramisu with chef Céline Pham (centre, with We Are Ona founder Luca Pronzato, left). The tiramisu was photographed as part of Pronzato’s new hospitality project in Arles, Casa Ideale
Ghetto Gastro
Ghetto Gastro are bang on the money
AA Murakami
Artist duo AA Murakami serves up ‘a cake made of foggy bubbles and a custom designed cake stand’
Tai Shani
A conceptual cake from artist Tai Shani
Lee Broom
Lee Broom’s cake is so light
Patcharivipa
A painting on canvas from jewellery designer Patcharivipa
Marcio Kogan
‘When we received this exciting invitation from Wallpaper*, our first ideas came from AI-baked cakes. The temptation was huge, but we decided to go the old-school way, which is way more fun,’ writes the team at architect Marcio Kogan’s Studio MK27.
‘Luiza Lafer is a young Brazilian pastry chef, trained at Le Cordon Bleu Paris and a longtime friend of MK27, having grown up in an MK27 house from the early 2000s. She has been described as the Tim Burton of pastry, as each of her creations has its own fantastic atmosphere. Dressed in a Mendl's pastry-shop apron straight out of The Grand Budapest Hotel, Luiza reinterpreted MK27’s architectural grammar in edible form. Together, we designed an anniversary cake made of tropical-coloured jelly. Each jelly, flavored with a different Brazilian fruit – jabuticaba, caju and acerola – forms a landscape of classical geometric shapes, the kind we design every day. For architects who usually build in concrete, wood and glass, this was a joyful exercise in scale, colour and transparency.
‘The ensemble celebrates Wallpaper’s wonderful endeavour of bringing the warmth of Brazilian design to the world stage.’
Perfumer H
A bespoke hand-blown 325g engraved candle from Perfumer H, for us to blow out
Wallpaper’s 30th-anniversary, October 2026 Guest Editors’ Issue – with guest-edited sections by Es Devlin, Carrie Mae Weems and Palace Skateboards – is available from 3 September, in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple News +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* today