Chy Gift Guide :: For The Candle Lover
I did a few gift guides last year and they went pretty well! I was hoping to get these out earlier (like November) but alas, life happened and it didn’t happen. For gift guides I like seeing what people already have rather than purely suggested items. It always feels a bit more personal and I hope you guys feel that way too! One luxury that has stood the test of time has to be candles. You can find at least one in pretty much any household with a variety of reasons and purposes.
To be honest, my family only ever had candles in the case of a blackout. Surprisingly we had a lot of blackouts when I was growing up and our family would always whip out all the mini tea lights and place a few in every room. I always loved how cozy it felt to be in a dark room with candle lights flickering. I just never really got into candle burning as the only ones I ever really knew about were ones from Bath and Body Works, which were always way too sickly sweet and Yankee Candle, which always made me gag when I walked by with all the strong scents. I remember buying a candle in college from Gilt but never actually knew how to properly burn it so it would tunnel terribly. Once how I learned to properly burn and take care of candles, you could say that I became a full fledged candle addict. If you need tips on how to take care of your candles, read my candle tips post here!
You can find candles in varieties of sizes, colors (both jar color and wax color), and price ranges.
As such, I think that candles make excellent gifts for all people! These days you can find candle brands left and right - with excellent quality in whichever price range you feel most comfortable with. When possible, I do enjoy getting soy wax candles as I find they burn a lot cleaner than some others. If you tend to get that black cloud on your wall from candle smoke, I’d advise you to 1. cut the wick so it’s shorter and possibly avoid bigger clouds or 2. get a soy candle since they tend to burn cleaner!
When gifting, sometimes it’s easy to buy numerous minis and gift them to friends. They make excellent stocking stuffers and you can gift scents that you know the person may end up preferring. For example, the Diptyque Mini Candle Set at Nordstrom can be gifted to a Candle lover, or you can split them up and save yourself from purchasing several gifts. I think giving a mini candle along with a sticker-decorated lighter would be cute! Personally I stick all my Glossier stickers all over my lighters to give them a cuter flare ;).
The Affordable Candle Choices
Another fairly recent brand I tried that has been on my list for forever has to be Boy Smells, which are coconut wax and beeswax. These are surprisingly very affordable at $29 each. I follow them on Instagram and when they had their anniversary sale, I decided to snag up some candles that were on my list. I honestly love all three that I have and I know that they would be quite popular as a gift. They burn very easily and evenly so these are especially good for any candle newbies out there. If you don’t want to buy this from the site directly, you can also watch The Stell for sales/deals.
For a relatively budget friendly candle, I cannot recommend enough the Otherland candles, which happen to be soy candles if you are interested. Each Otherland candle is $36, but if you purchase their 3-pack of candles you can save $19, which brings each candle down right below $30. With every candle order you will receive a cute box and a set of matches. While I am keen to order candles individually to get a matchbox, the 3-pack is just too good of a deal to pass. For some giveaways I have purchased the 3-packs and bought extras solely for gifting purpose. My two favorite candles have to be Canopy and Rattan - Canopy is extremely fresh yet creamy (?) and is the perfect candle to burn come Fall season. Aside from holiday season and gifting, I highly recommend subscribing to their emails as they do tend to bring out limited edition candles and seasonal/holiday candles. I have a candle from them during their Amber Vittoria artist collaboration and I do wish that I had picked up an extra for gifting!
One favorite candle brand in my household has to be PF Candle Co - another soy candle! Our hands down favorite scent from the range is Amber & Moss. PF Candle Co has a variety of scents in many different sizes. I’ve actually seen a lot of people taking mini candles when traveling since it helps bring a place of home with you when you aren’t in your familiar place. I love that the PF candles have a lid so it makes it a bit more friendly to travel with and your items won’t *completely* smell like the candle itself. They specifically have a travel candle with 2.5 oz of product which is a decent size!
A brand I’ve also had my eye on is Sunday Forever. I’ve seen numerous people talking about their coconut scent - both their fragrances and their candles. I picked one up during Sunday Forever x @DirtyBoysGetClean collab for their Woodcox candle (which is temporarily sold out). The throw on the Woodcox candle is insane and it would honestly make a great unisex gift!
Onto the more luxurious candle choices //
One of my standout favorite candle brands right now has to be Overose. From their picturesque pink candles to their swoon-worthy holographic candle jars, you can bet these candles are on the envy list of every beauty influencer out there. Any gal would be over the moon to receive an Overose candle! And don’t even get me started on their scents - they are undeniably beautiful with a scent that throws without even being lit. These candles are made from Rapeseed Wax and they burn quickly and evenly! Tbh I haven’t yet had the guts to burn my holo candle, but I haven’t seen anyone mention any issues with the outer sticker melting at all.
I already mentioned Diptyque above, but if you aren’t looking to buy the minis you can go full-fledged fancy with a full-sized Diptyque candle. The votives are iconic as re-purposed jars and I’d say Diptyque candles are luxurious “alive” or “dead.” Diptyque candles are iconic and people of all ages can enjoy them. Their scent range is quite wide so you’re sure to find something for any of your loved ones. I wouldn’t even say that Diptyque is gender specific - I’d say it’s pretty gender neutral.
Another gender-neutral luxury candle brand is Byredo. Byredo candles are probably the priciest of them all but 100% worth it for any candle fanatic out there. I bought two almost 2 years ago now but am only halfway through one of them. These candles are extremely potent and the smell on these are so strong that the one I have yet to burn is still emitting it’s scent throughout my room whenever I take it out. When I visited NY in October, I stopped by the Byredo store and sniffed all the candles. It was pretty much a hit with so many of them with the exception of I think two. These candles take 5-ever to burn and pool evenly so know that these ones will last a long time. I’m actually keen on getting some of the mini candles as I think that those will last a hell of a long time. I’m also super excited that Byredo is now carried at Nordstrom! Especially since Neiman Marcus stopped carrying them in-store. Hopefully the Nordstrom near me starts carrying them in-store soon (although that’ll be quite tempting).
ALTERNATIVE SCENT // I know a lot of people actually keep candles around to burn for the scent, but for those that don’t exactly like the burning carcinogens around them (like my family, lol) - there are reed diffusers / wall plug diffusers around. While I’m not a fan of plug-in diffusers anymore, I do still love the reed diffusers. My friend recommended NEST Fragrances Reed Diffuser in Grapefruit which I snagged during the Spring Sephora VIB sale. I saved it until I moved into my new place and I’ve had it cracked open for about 2.5 months now and I’d say there’s still 90% left. I probably should’ve kept the plug for it somewhere so I can cap it when it’s time to move.
EXTRA // I think there are definitely some great candle tools that would make perfect gifts to those who are candle lovers or alongside a candle. My favorite tool has to be a candle wick trimmer. Whenever T’s friends come over, they all ask what type of torture device this is. A few people have also mentioned how it’s so unnecessary because scissors can do the job. My answer? Yes and no. When you get down bottom to a deep jar, it’s quite hard to get the candle and if you like to do it right after you blow out the candle, you can’t tip the jar at an angle. If you’re investing money into some quality candles, you eat be taking good care of them! I just got a quick pair over on Amazon, but many brands are starting to sell their own. I ended up getting a black one because I didn’t really want to be able to see any black wick remainders lol. Aside from the wick trimmer, there’s also a wick dipper and snuffer. The wick dipper lets you dip a blown out wick that’s smoking into melted wax to stop the endless cloud of smoke. I’m not sure how I feel about this but I can see this working well in theory. The snuffer actually is something that has been on my list and I think I’ll be looking into one to get. I did find a trio on Amazon that is actually quite affordable and comes with all three tools mentioned!
What do you think of candles as a gifted item?
What are your favorite brands / scents when it comes to candles?
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All products mentioned in this post have been purchased by myself with my own money.
This post contains affiliate links. Feel free to read more on my disclaimer.