How To Recycle Your Used Candles

1. Put out your tealight cups on the work surface, make sure it is a FLAT LEVEL SURFACE
2. Set the pre-tabbed tealight wicks in the tealight cups.
3. Try to get them at center, although during pour they will probably shift to one side a little

NOTE: Some candle makers prefer to pour the wax first and place the pre-tabbed wick in the tealight cup right after the wax is poured. The choice is yours. We advocate the pre-placement of wicks in the tealight cups to reduce the chance of wax overflow and drips from the tealight cup.

1. Spray inside of the votive mold with silicone mold release spray, if you are using it. To do this follow the directions on the Silicone Mold Release Spray, or hold the spray nozzle 8 to 10 inches from the votive mold and spray the inside with one or two short bursts.
2. Place votive mold open end up on the work surface, make sure it is a FLAT LEVEL SURFACE.
3. Place pre-tabbed votive wicks inside the votive mold
4. Try to get them at center, although during pour they will probably shift to one side a little

NOTE: Some candle makers prefer to pour the wax first and place the pre-tabbed wick in the votive mold right after the wax is poured. The choice is yours. We advocate the pre-placement of wicks in the votive molds to reduce the chance of wax overflow and drips from the votive mold.

You will need either a steamer pot or deep sauce pan, and you will also need a melting pot with a pouring spout. These two items create a double boiler to melt down your old candles.

Fill the bottom part of your double boiler (the steamer pot or the deep sauce pan) with about two inches of cool water, and place on the burner set to high temperature. When the water begins to boil, turn the heat down to medium low or low.

Place the candles to be melted down into the melting pot with a pouring spout, set the melting pot in a boiling water, and attend to it as the wax liquefies. NOTE: Do not place the melting pot into the water until it begins to boil.

It is quite likely that the wick and wick clip that your candle was originally made with, if you weren’t able to remove them before melting, will have drifted to the bottom of the melting pot. That is okay, they can stay there until after you have poured your candles. It takes a lot more trouble and makes a bigger mess to try to fish them out when the melting pot is full of wax, than to just let them be and dump them in the garbage after you have completed your candles.

If you are trying to recycle an old jar candle, you may find these instructions for removing the wax from the jar helpful. Please note that the goal of this process is to get the wax from the jar into the melting pot with the pouring spout, so that you can use it to pour new candles.