There's a particular kind of disappointment in a candle that has gone wrong. The wax burrows down the middle and leaves a hard white rim it will never reach. The flame gutters and throws black smoke up the inside of the glass. Fifty hours of fragrance becomes twenty, and the thing you bought to slow the evening down becomes another item on the list of things that didn't quite work.
Almost all of it is preventable, and almost none of it is your fault. Nobody tells you. A candle looks like the simplest object in the house — wax, a wick, a match — and so the small handful of things that determine whether it gives you everything or half of it go unsaid.
Here is what we've learned over the years of making and enjoying them at home.
Trim the wick before every single burn
This is the one. If you do nothing else, do this.
Trim to about ¼ inch — roughly 6mm — before you light it, every time, not just the first time. An untrimmed wick grows a mushroom of carbon at the tip. That carbon is what produces the black smoke, the soot on the glass, and the restless dancing flame that burns through your wax at speed.
A trimmed wick burns with a small, steady, upright flame. It uses less wax, throws more fragrance and keeps the glass clean. The difference between a trimmed and untrimmed candle over its lifetime is close to double the burn time.
You can pinch the carbon off with your fingers when the candle is cold, though it blackens everything it touches. Nail scissors reach into a votive but not down into a three-wick once it's burned low. A proper wick trimmer is angled to reach the bottom of a deep glass and catches the trimming in its own dish rather than dropping it into the wax.
Every AJA candle now comes with a wick trimmer. Add one to your basket alongside any candle and we'll take the £18 off at checkout — it's our gift, because a candle that burns properly is the one you come back to.
The first burn decides everything
A candle has a memory. Whatever it does the first time it's lit, it will do for the rest of its life.
Light it and leave it until the melted wax reaches the edge of the glass all the way round. On a single wick that's around two hours; on a three-wick, closer to three. If you blow it out before the pool reaches the edge, the candle sets a ring of unmelted wax at the perimeter and will burn straight down the middle from then on, leaving that wax stranded forever.
This is tunnelling, and it is the single most common way a good candle is wasted. It cannot be undone by burning it longer later — the memory is already set.
So don't light a new candle for twenty minutes before you go out. Light it when you have an evening.
Never burn for more than four hours
The opposite problem. Past about four hours the glass gets hot, the wick leans and starts to mushroom, and the flame grows beyond what the wax can feed cleanly. You get smoke, soot and a candle that's drinking its own fragrance.
Four hours, then let it cool and set. You'll get more evenings out of it, and each one will smell the way it's supposed to.
Put it out gently
A hard blow sends a plume of smoke through the room and sprays wax up the inside of the glass, which is a shame after a whole evening of it looking beautiful. Blow softly and from the side rather than straight down, and most of that is avoided.
Then, while the wax is still liquid, check the wick is standing upright and central. Wax sets within minutes and wherever the wick is at that moment is where it stays — leaning against the glass means an uneven burn next time, and a scorch mark you can't remove.
Keep the pool clean
Anything floating in the melted wax — a trimming, a spent match, a fragment of carbon — is a second wick. It will catch, burn unevenly and can crack the glass. Fish it out while the wax is liquid, or lift it off once it's cold.
Know when to stop
When the wax is down to about a centimetre, that's it. Below that the flame sits too close to the base and the glass gets hot enough to crack.
Don't throw the glass away, though. It's hand-blown in Istanbul and it's the most beautiful part of the candle.
Then refill it
Warm soapy water and a little patience is all it takes — our wax is entirely natural and water-soluble, so it lifts out cleanly. Not the dishwasher; the heat is too much for hand-blown glass. Peel off the adhesive pad from the base and check the glass for cracks while you're there.
Then take a refill, remove the cover from the adhesive pad underneath, and press it firmly into the base. Light it for two hours that first time, exactly as you would a new candle, so it sets its memory to the edge of the glass.
Refills are available for both our single-wick and three-wick candles, in all four fragrances. They cost significantly less than a new candle, and they mean the glass you fell in love with stays on the shelf rather than going into recycling.
Where to keep them
Cool, dry, out of direct sunlight. Heat softens natural wax and can warp the surface; sunlight fades both the colour and the fragrance over time. A cupboard is better than a windowsill, however good it looks there.
Our candles are hand-poured in the UK from a blend of coconut, soya and beeswax, with no paraffin and no synthetic fragrance. The glass is hand-blown in Istanbul.
