Are natural candles any better for you?

 

 

The  perfect example of this statement is a naturally occurring element – lead. Leaded wicks were not uncommon, but they have been deemed toxic and then banned from the use in candle making in 2003, despite being natural.

In our candles, we chose to use of linen wick. These are also natural, but not at all harmful. Linen wicks don’t burn off completely, unlike cotton wicks, so they require trimming. In return, however, you get a much more even and cleaner burn. This made them the product of choice for us.

 

Being able to use solely high quality essential oils would be any candle maker’s dream - the aroma, the purity. But the reality is that the selection of essential oils is limited. So not only would this impact the variety of products you would be able to offer, moreover, some essential oils are highly demanding in raw ingredients, making them rather expensive and, more importantly, not at all sustainable. But if you do your research, like we did, you can actually find man-made alternatives that are even created from the same compounds as the essential oils, thank you science. This is an excellent option for those like us, who do not want to jeopardise the overall quality of their range, where the bar has been set high by the use of essential oils to begin with, but also want to keep their products as sustainable as possible and affordable for their customers.

 

Similarly to the essential oils, there are two perspectives to consider here. What are the qualities of the wax when being burnt and how it is sourced. The most commonly use wax on the market is still paraffin. And even with the disclaimer that not all synthetic things are bad, paraffin is a derivative of petroleum oil, so no matter how we slice it, we can’t see how it could be sourced sustainably. This is why we’ve opted for the use of soya wax. No doubt soya farming in certain locations is problematic too, however our wax come from the US and is in fact a bi-product of the industry.

Burning paraffin wax has also been linked to increased allergic reactions and asthma, when in comparison beeswax or soy wax have not. So even with the regulations in place, we don’t mean to imply that our paraffin wax competitors are not up to the code, natural wax still seems like a safer option to us.

 

So these three components – wicks, wax and oils are really what makes a candle better or not. And you can get a high quality candle, even if not all three are purely natural. At the end of the day, what you burn is what you breathe, so it is worth paying attention to. We always recommend following the burning instructions as given and then noticing how cleanly your candle has burnt. If you trim the wick, burn the candle for a long enough time, on an even surface without any draughts, you should hopefully end up with minimal soot on the container and in your space. Or you would do with our natural candles. And we’ll just leave it at that.