Candles and Sense

In a perfect world, our homes would alternate between the smells of fresh cut flowers and homemade chocolate chip cookies. We know as well as anyone else that once in a while, everyone could use a little shortcut. Since we live in the days of the $100+ scented candle and we’ve witnessed some fairly hideous scents, we thought it might be helpful to provide a guide of sorts to home fragrance options.

Room Sprays – Think of room sprays as perfume for your home. A few quick pumps of the atomizer and a lovely, if short-lived scent fills the air. We're loving West Elm's Seagrass. This is a perfect scent for anyone who is a sucker for the smell of fresh cut grass. We're also a bit sad that the Wasabi Green-Tea Room Freshener from Williams-Sonoma seems to no longer be available, as that was also a welcome addition to any room. The scent, while unexpected, was definitely a nice surprise. Finally, we’re dying to try this Verbena scent from L’Occitane. Granted, room sprays don’t last as long as some of the other options but we often view that as a positive.


Reed Diffusers – We’ve been in the company of this type of home fragrance without incident but we’ve never had the courage to try them ourselves. They remind us way too much of incense. Incense makes us think of superficially spiritual yoga classes, natural clothing boutiques and that god-awful smell outside the Union Square Whole Foods. Who buys that stuff? Anyway, we think this orchid scent might be ok but we're still frightened of the potential spillage of that weird liquid goo so instead, we're going to recommend...

Candles - The simplest and most common form of home fragrance is the scented candle. We have some strong favorites in this category. Diptyque makes some incredibly luxurious bougies (francais for candles) and we can't get enough of the Jasmine variety. We also love this incredible brand called Burn. Yes, they are expensive but these candles give off their fragrance even before they're lit, thus providing a lot of so-called "bang for the buck." Lest you think the Aesthetes are high end snobs (well, we sort of are) we'll let you in on a little secret. The savvy consumer can fulfill their home fragrance needs with very affordable products. Dare we say the words Yankee Candle Company? Well friends, here are the rules:

1. We’re sticklers for this one, no fruity scents, ever. For men or women, we don’t care, there’s just no excuse for this. It reminds us of the scent of our (well, Betsy's) My Little Ponies and its gross. Fruity scented candles are to actual fruit scents as Jolly Ranchers are to actual fruit tastes.

2. No Vanilla. Who doesn’t love the scent of fresh baked cookies? However, we think most vanilla candles come off as sickly sweet so in this case, you’re actually going to have to bake something. (Phat Tony: "Well, sure, you could be reminded of cookies. You could also be reminded of Playdoh.") Trust us, your party guests and/or neighbors will thank you.

3. If you like florals, no problem, just stay away from the roses. We're not saying a nice Diptyque Rose candle is out of the question, we're just saying the inexpensive kind will smell like old ladies. We promise.

4. We think the secret to a nice inexpensive candle is to explore the woody scents and the linen scents. As we move into the fall/winter season, we love a nice pine scent. Yankee Candle offers Balsam and Cedar, Mistletoe, and Christmas Wreath. On the lighter side we have the fragrances meant to approximate fresh laundry drying in the midday sun such as Clean Cotton, Sunwashed Linen, Country Linen.

5. No home fragrance option is a substitute for a clean environment. This probably goes without saying but any sort of attempts to mask bad odors is futile one must begin the process with a blank slate.