Well, if you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you’ll know I’ve been speculating about dying plain white supermarket novena candles (the tall ones in the glass jars). So I did a little experiment today, which worked out almost as well as I had hoped. The picture shows one white candle and one brown candle on my altar – but this morning they were both white.
All I did was to warm one up in a pot of simmering water until it melted, and then stir in a little orange and black dye. (I’m not quite satisfied with the color yet, but it’s certainly brown enough to do some Court Case work.
Keeping the wick straight was a little tricky – I’m not entirely sure I’ve got the wick all the way back down to the bottom of the glass, but I did my best.
Another problem can be seen here:
This is quite common, in fact, normal, to hand-poured candles. The wax shrinks as it cools. What I need to do is melt and dye just a smidge more wax and pour it right into the hole you see here.
Either that, or insulate the candle so it cools more slowly – yes, I have some more research to do.
Once again – I love my work!