Colonial Candle Making

In Colonial times candle making was a necessity, but it was also a way for women to make beautiful and useful objects for their homes.

Candles were essential in Colonial times because without electricity or costly oil, there was no other source of light at night.

Colonial-era candles were commonly made out of tallow, or animal fat, which didn’t burn well or smell good. Rich people could use beeswax for their candles, which both smelled and burned better, but it was not widely available to the masses.

The colonists discovered they could make wax that produced clean-burning, good-smelling candles by boiling the berries of the bayberry shrub. This was a very time consuming process, however, and never really caught on as a way for large quantities of candles to be made. Bayberry wax is still available today.

In the 1700s, the whaling industry took off in the waters around the colonies. This provided the colonists with a good deal of whale oil, from which was developed spermaceti wax.

This wax still didn’t smell very good but it was better than tallow, and the candles had the advantage of holding up during the hot summer months, which Colonial candle makers appreciated.

It isn’t likely that you’ll be able to get your hands on whale oil (or that you would want to) in order to make authentic Colonial candles.

If you live along the east coast or North Atlantic regions of America or Canada, you could collect the berries from a local bayberry bush and make your own bayberry candles in the traditional way.

The only problem with that is it takes five to eight pounds of berries to make one pound of wax, and using the traditional process to get pure wax it takes several days to prepare the berries to be made into a candle.

If you aren’t too concerned about doing it the proper way, you can always buy bayberry wax and melt and pour like you would any other candle.

Of course one major way candle making differs today from the way it was done in Colonial times is that we have all sorts of molds, from metal to silicone to polyurethane, that allow us to make candles in all sorts of wonderful shapes and sizes. We also have braided wicks, where they would have used strands of cotton that required a lot of maintenance to keep lit.

Colonial candle makers may have had some access to molds, but these were usually wooden boxes similar to those used as soap molds.

Most candles made for home use were taper candles made by dipping the wick repeatedly into a vat of melted wax. Each dip would allow a little more wax to adhere to the wick, which would eventually become candle sized.

If you really want to know what it was like to make candles in Colonial times, here’s the craft for you. Melt some wax, either bayberry or paraffin, in a coffee can, melting pot or other tall and narrow but deep vessel. Don’t use a regular kitchen pan for this process. You need something deep that doesn’t require you at melt a lot of excess wax.

Use a non-waxed taper wick, weighted down at the end you will dip into the wax with a washer. If you want to make cool old-fashioned tapers where two candles are joined at the wick, use a bulldog clip to hold the center part of the wick and allow the two ends to run down opposite sides of the clip. Weigh down each end so the wax will coat evenly.

Once your wax is completely melted, take it off the heat. Put the can on a flat, heat-resistant surface and dip the wick into the wax. The first dip, hold the wick in the wax until it stops bubbling. Each dip thereafter should just be in and out. You’ll want to wait briefly between dips, and you can even hang your tapers between dips if you’re making several candles at once.

Don’t allow that candle to cool completely between dips, however. Stir the wax occasionally so the heat is even throughout. You will probably need to reheat the wax during this process.

Keep dipping until your candle is the diameter you would like. This can take a long time, so be patient. Hang the candles to harden (clip the wick to a hanger) then cut off the end of the candle to make a flat surface. If you want to burn the two candles you have made from one wick, cut them apart and trim the wicks to about a quarter of an inch before burning. Enjoy!

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