Burning Yearning for Candles: A Pyromaniac Christmas Shopping List (and a draw)

For my Christmas shopping, I'm going for candles: in fact, unless I can make up a seasonal, fragrant bouquet at the florist’s, I offer candles year-round instead of wine, candy or flowers. 

As I was pondering a list of suggestions for year-end celebration gifts, I suddenly occurred to me you could create the illusion of living in a large house – nay, a château – by having different candles for different “rooms”.

With its caramelized brioche and hot chocolate, Jovoy’s Let them eat cake is the perfect, cosy breakfast-in-bed illusion, sans les crumbs in the sheets. The lipstick-red hat box and glass bell (for protection against dust and evaporation) turn Jovoy candles into particularly irresistible gifts, though for the time being they can only be found in the Paris boutique and a few European locations.

François Hénin, the owner of Jovoy, adds his bit of advice: don’t use the glass bell to put out the candle. With a long cedar match of the type used for cigars or fireplaces, you can use the wooden end to dip the wick into the wax and lift it out. This avoids the unpleasant fumes you get when you blow the candle out. Also make sure to trim the wick after use.

For a bracing scent in the breakfast nook, Parfum d’Empire Lantana Camara plays on the citrusy-green facets of shrub verbena. For lunchtime, you can switch to the green, aromatic Feuilles de Tomate by Parfums d’Orsay.

For the bathroom, Parfums d’Orsay Bois de Coton by Olivia Giacobetti, exudes the scent of freshly laundered towels (iris and musc) and wood (cedar and oak).

For the dressing table, I’d pick L’Artisan Parfumeur La Traversée du Bosphore, with its retro rose-and-violet lipstick, soft suede and deliciously almond-y touch (the iris-leather accord feels stronger in the candle than in the fragrance).

For the study, the brand new Chez Monsieur by Bruno Jovanovic for Frédéric Malle conjures Mr. Malle’s father’s office by blending the aromas of Havana tobacco, leather and books: unlit, it gives off a compelling, musty earth scent.

For the artist’s studio, Dans l’Atelier de Cézanne, conceived by Olivia Giacobetti for the artist Vincent Beaurin’s exhibition in Cézanne’s studio in Aix-en-Provence is wonderfully dry, dusty-woody and meditative (it is now available at Luckyscent).

For the chapel (or just to imagine you have one), nothing beats Comme des Garçons Avignon from the Incense Series – the candle is a bit more balsamic than the perfume; Annick Goutal Encens Flamboyant is a less church-y alternative, with a deliciously fruity, Christmas-y fir balsam note. Frédéric Malle is also now offering an incense candle based on Bruno Jovanovic’s memories of briefly serving as an altar boy with Notre Dame.  Jovoy also features In Nomine Patris, Filii et Spiritu Sancti in its line-up.

For a more secular take on Christmas, Annick Goutal’s orange and pine Bougie de Noël now comes in a mammoth five-wick, 300-hour, 1.5 kg size.

For the living room, if you haven’t had the time to run out to the florist’s, Parfum d’Empire Lys Casablanca features lily at its fiercest: spicy, creamy, indolic… Even unlit, the candle can scent up a whole room.

La Fleur du Roy by Arty Fragrance, the new line conceived by the perfume historian Élisabeth de Feydeau as a tribute to Versailles where she lives, blends the Sun King’s beloved orange blossom with civet and castoreum, which might be a first step towards the boudoir… Better to enjoy her Alcôve Royale massage candle, inspired by the 18^thcentury aphrodisiac beverage favoured by Louis XV and the Marquise de Pompadour, a blend of cocoa, vanilla and ambergris… For the time being, the collection is only sold in Paris and Brussels – all the more reason to cross the Atlantic or the Channel – but the website will soon be up.

  

Now on to you: drop me a comment to tell me which candle you’d offer as a gift – or keep for yourself – during the festive season and I’ll do a draw for one of Parfum d’Empire’s new mini-candles, in a 35g format: the winner will have the choice between four fragrances.

Added Dec. 14th: the draw is now closed.

llustration: Still from Erich von Stroheim's unfinished Queen Kelly (1928), with Gloria Swanson.