Candle-Making 101: Increasing Your Candle Scent's Reach

By now you know all about fragrance in your candle-making: how to add it to your wax, what effect additives will have on it, and the pros and cons of synthetic fragrance versus essential oils. (If you haven't come this far yet, check out part 4 of this series.) Now that you've learned about fragrances, you can learn how to improve that fragrance's reach-that is, the diameter around your candle where the scent can be detected.

Increasing the reach of your scented candle isn't difficult, and with practice you'll be able to get a feel for it to the point this will become second nature to you. Before you begin, make sure your fragrance is of good quality; a discount fragrance might make your candle smell nice for a while, but cheap scents don't usually last long and can't reach as far as the higher quality fragrances.

As I've mentioned before, you don't need much fragrance in the mixture-only about 1 ounce or one-half teaspoon for every pound of wax. If you find the scent is too strong or too harsh at this quantity you can use less later on (or more if you find it too weak), but you need to start somewhere and I find one-half teaspoon to be sufficient. This is also a good time to make sure you scent's oil is blending well with your wax mixture; the wax should be around 180-185 degrees Fahrenheit. If your fragrance is pooling in your candle, you may need to heat the wax more before mixing in the scent.

Another key point to look for is making sure the fragrance is dispersed throughout your wax uniformly. Otherwise, you'll have an overwhelming scent at times when the candle is burning, and other times you won't have any scent at all. If you find your scented candle has no scent when you begin burning it but the fragrance overwhelms you further down the candle, your fragrance is settling in your wax mixture (like oil separates from water.) An easy way to counteract this is to add a little stearin (vybar for candles with rubber molds) to your wax mixture, about one-half teaspoon full. The additive will help your candle retain its consistency as it cools, keeping the wax and fragrance well blended; if you find the additive is detracting from the candle's burn rate, cut back on the amount until you can strike a balance.

Once you're certain you have a good quality fragrance, are sure you're using enough of it and are blending it well enough, scrutinize the top pf your candle to make sure it's level. You'll have to repour enough wax around the wick to fill the hole, or if you're making a container candle you can reheat the top of the candle and fill in the area that way. The wick should be level when it sticks out of the wax, not in the middle of a crater. If it isn't level, it will droop and die out in a pool of wax. (This is why many store-bought candles don't last as long as they could, because the well around the wick causes insufficient burning.) Be careful if you use a hair dryer or other similar tool to remelt the wax in a container candle: you can burn yourself if you aren't careful, and in rare cases you can even light the wick prematurely.

Because the wax pool is where the fragrance emanates and not the oil that's combusting with the flame, that's where you want to concentrate your efforts. New candle-makers frequently make the mistake of concentrating on the scent burning within the flame, but the scent we detect actually comes from the warmed wax around the wick releasing the fragrance oil. The pool doesn't have to be large, especially with a smaller candle; if you dip your fingertip in the pool (figuratively, of course-I wouldn't recommend actually doing it) you should be able to cover the top, between one-eight and one-quarter of an inch. Any deeper and your burn rate can be affected. It can also be potentially dangerous, overheating your candleholder or container, so it's something you really need to pay attention to. You can adjust your wick size and height on future candles to alter your ideal wax pool. A quarter-inch pool, although it sounds small, should be strong enough to fill a large room if you've considered the above in your candle-making process.

This article builds on the previous articles in the series. With a little practice and determination, you should be able to create candles that rival the ones you find in any store-perhaps even better.