Altar candles come up in a lot of conversations about how to set up a witch’s altar. As explained previously, a witch’s altar is highly personal and can vary greatly depending on culture and traditions. Altar candles are no different. All I can do is show you my way and our coven’s tradition.
Get excited about making your own altar candles though, like many other witch’s tools, it’s an extension of you.
Many visitors to our metaphysical shop often see me making a batch of these at the front of the store, come visit! Connect with us for more on Instagram, Facebook (Meta) or TikTok.
Just because someone uses a scented candle with some crystals and perhaps a few charms, doesn’t make it an altar candle. Though, I suppose you could use that. But if you’re buying it for that purpose, my belief is you’re wasting your money. That’s different than buying a spell candle from someone that is enchanted to honor a deity or for a love spell. Your best bet for making magic happen is to make your own altar candles.
What are Altar Candles For?
Altar candles, at least pertaining to most witchcraft practices, are the center and focal point of the altar. A witch’s altar, of course, is the center and focal point of sacred space in which we work. We don’t just want to light any candle and place it upon the altar.
For magical workings, altar candles raise power and produce spiritual energies. They can magnify, amplify energy and spellwork. Altar candles often keep unwanted energies at bay, banishing and purifying the working area.
The type and style, even the number of altar candles is going to vary greatly according to culture, tradition and practice of the witch. For example, in some Arthurian magical traditions, one white and one black candle are used as they symbolize balance of the dark and light. In some hoodoo, voodoo and other magical practices, the altar may have several candles on it.
While I normally have just one high altar candle burning, I sometimes do place four additional candles for the elemental corners. It depends on the work I’m doing. These are elemental candles, I don’t consider these “high altar candles:. I choose four colors that correspond with the four directions and the elements. I design and dress these for inviting and holding elemental energy.
There are candles of all kinds, but spell candles are not the same as your altar candle.
Altar Candles: Scratch or Remodel?
So, for this article, I’ll just be using one candle, starting with an inexpensive soy pillar and crafting my altar candle. I tend to remodel mine, vs from scratch.
If you’ve never made candles, it’s quite messy and time-consuming. Making your own altar or spell candles from scratch can be very gratifying, but there is nothing wrong with remodeling.
Remodeling can also be very economical too. I use plain soy short pillar candles. Candles are made from many different types of wax. Pillar candles are also safer on the altar for less chance of being knocked over. Never leave a candle burning unattended.
Unscented soy smokes less, is less expensive, and quite easy to carve, which I consider an extra bonus. I get mine mostly from dollar stores, believe it or not, and save me quite a bit of money.
Preparing Candles
Assuming you have chosen and obtained your candle (or poured your own), now it’s time to prepare them for “dressing”. Dressing is simply a term witches use to describe carving, oiling and powdering a candle.
Remove all the packaging and be especially careful to remove stickers on the bottoms of candles. That paper can become like a giant wick and produce quite a flame. This can lead to shattering your candle glass and become quite a fire hazard.
I have a dedicated cauldron specifically for smoke-cleansing items I work with like wands or athames. I use white sage and a little dragon’s blood. Enchant the sage and the dragon’s blood separately. I teach my coven to enchant everything, every step of the way. If you are unsure, read Enchantment Magic as a good guide to success.
I enchant the herbs/powders according to their magical properties. White sage is perfect for purification, so I enchant it to purify the candles, thus removing any unwanted energies. The dragon’s blood I enchant for cleansing, manifestation and potency. In short, I’m enchanting the dragon’s blood to not only cleanse my altar candles, but to make their purpose manifest and to make them potent.
I also smoke-cleanse the candle glass that holds my altar candles. To the candle glass, I also enchant and add a layer of salt. I enchant the salt to keep the area purified, and this helps to level the candle so it’s not sitting at an angle.
Lastly, I trim the wick to ¼ of an inch. This really helps prevent tunneling and encourages proper burning. It’s a bummer when your candle tunnels and you only get half the burn hours you should have.
Dressing the Candle – Carving
Here is the fun part, and where you get to be creative. Your coven or tradition may already have expected sigils and symbols. If not, there’s a lot of room for creativity.
In this image, notice both the top and the side of the candle, but let’s start with the top. It is best to do any carving before oiling or powdering.
You can create your own special and magical candle carving tool or purchase one. I like little pen-knives but also iron nails and special made tools.
On the top of the candle, I have the “horns of power” and representative of the Horned God and masculine divine energy. Notice the little waning crescent moon? This is representative of the goddess, in this case Hecate. It is placed between the antlers.
I have always believed the male energy in the universe must never ignore the female energy. Otherwise, things wither and die. I teach my coven that witchcraft is like a bow; the female energy drawing power, or gestating, and the male energy looses the arrow. Without both, the bow is useless.
Now, you don’t have to do that, this is but my way only. You are free to art your altar candles in any manner you see fit. I am merely giving you an explanation and hopefully inspiring you to create your own.
On the side of the candle, it looks like a letter “H”, which (for me) stands for Hecate but is also the first letter of my last name. The right side composes the letter “C”, which stands for Cernunnos, another name for the Horned God. You see an arrow flying through the “H”, left to right. This reminds me of the bow and how both male and female are engaged in working magic.
Dressing the Candle: Oil and Powder
I then continue to dress the candle with a spell oil. In this case, I use our coven’s manifestation oil. I can’t share the exact making of that oil as we are all oath-bound. You can use any oil or spell oil you like but choose with purpose.
Once the candles are oiled, time for the powder and empowering the sigil and symbol work. For this, I am rubbing the ground herb powder vigorously into the sigils and symbols to empower them.
Make sure to brush or wipe away any excess oil or powder, it can interfere with the quality of burn performance.
Your choice of powder is wide-open here too. As for myself, I use our coven’s intention powder with extra dragon’s blood. Even though the intention powder is already enchanted at its making, I still enchant it for specific purposes. The same with the dragon’s blood, to increase potency and power.
Intention powder goes back a long way and is a mix of many herbs enchanted and ground together. Ours’ is a mix of 70+ various herbs and an astounding mix of magical properties. We only sell that in our metaphysical shop currently. You can find a lot of herbs on our website like herbs by magical property, though those are bulk herbs, but find the ones you like, we also offer all herbs in 1 oz and 2 oz packets.
You could use as little as one to three herbs or a dozen or more, it’s up to you. Ginger and dragon’s blood both excel at raising power for instance. I always work with and suggest working with prime numbers when choosing ingredients.
Hopefully you are inspired now, happy candle carving!
Since the altar post I have put my altar together. I found some beautiful bees wax pillar candles and made them as you stated. I even created a sigil for them. I’m pleased with them. I may pour some in the future as I’ve started to learn how. The first time it was lit was beautiful. It keeps being so. Thank you for these instructions. I may switch things up next time.
🙂 I love working with beeswax! It is so luscious and the energy is just divine. I sometimes use beeswax, especially for personal magic. But, I also use soy, like for the store altar where people pop their prayer requests into our prayer box. That’s because we go through a lot of those altar candles burning them non-stop for days at a whack. 🙂 But yes, absolutely love beeswax. Bees have long been considered divine, and messengers to the gods. What one bee knows, the whole hive knows, and once a hive knows, all hive knows. Astounding they are also responsible for two out of three bites of food we eat, save the bees! I keep my gardens bee friendly, never using poisons of any kind. I find them very gentle and could swear the fae hitchhike on them. 🙂 Blessings!
I really enjoy personalizing my own altar candles. I can definitely feel the raise in power as well as the elemental energy when I call circle. Brings me closer to the divine and have more appreciation. I highly recommend witches use altar candles.
Excellent, I am also quite glad you enjoy the process of personalizing your altar candles. It does make a difference! 🙂
This article really helps with further knowledge of how to set up my alter. When placing an alter candle, or candles, is there a certain area on the alter to place it/them? I’m sure if using candles to represent the elementals they should be placed in accordance to the direction that corresponds with the specific element. But say I just want to have one high alter candle, should that be placed somewhere specific? Also, when working a spell that requires candle magic, would you light the high alter candle as well as the candle used for the specific candle magic spell?
Hi Mary, excellent questions. 🙂 Some may do it differently than I, but my high altar candle is in the direct center, and equal distance from the elemental “corners” on my altar. If I am doing a spell candle, that is usually done at my dedicated work table, though sometimes I let it finish on the altar on top of my altar tile (see picture of my altar, look for the gold colored pentacle just below the altar candle.) If you are doing that, you need to ensure wax doesn’t drip all over your altar. I may have a spell candle on top of a sour jar or witch bottle for instance, and that goes on top of my altar tile to boost power and effectiveness, but that would still be on top of yet another mirror or small plate. Sometimes I use lids from jars upside down to catch wax. Now, if I move the altar from “resting” to active and reassemble the altar on my work table, I don’t worry about it, plenty of room and the wax drippings come right off. 🙂 Let me know if this clarifies it all for you. Blessings!
I do have a question for the more frugal witches out here including myself.
Even with wick trimming I still experience tunneling with a few of my alter candles which creates waste. Would it be considered offensive to melt down used alter candles to create new ones? Do you think the oils and dressings would interfere or maybe add an extra boost since the recycled product would also be recarved and dressed again on the same alter or different alter dedicated to the same deities and energies?
Hello Cassandra, good question! 🙂 There’s nothing wrong with melting down old candles or candles that have tunneled and fashioning new ones out of them. 🙂 You may have to carve and dress them again, but here are some more tips about tunneling: Oils, scents and powders: Don’t over-do it, always wipe the excess off especially the top as this can keep the candle from burning from the flame all the way to the edges. Speaking of burning, burn-time, let the candle burn long enough to burn all the way to the edges to promote an even burn top-down. Rotate the candle, sometimes air flow, like a ceiling fan or draft from an HVAC or even open window can cause a candle to start tunneling. Trim the wick to about 1/4 of an inch or 6 mm. That seems to work best. 🙂 Sorry for the slow reply, I just now saw your comment. Oh, one last thing: Make sure the candle glass or jar, if you are using one, is a tight fitting size for the candle, if the glass is cold, the candle wax won’t melt to the edges. Sometimes it really comes down to where the candle is placed. 🙂 Blessings!