Light up light up

Now the winter nights are upon us, stylist CATHY O'CLERYhas an insider's guide on how to warm up the atmosphere in your home by the use of one simple ingredient – candlelight

LOWERS DRESS A HOUSE, but flickering flames create a truly enchanting atmosphere. Entering a room bedecked with candlelight, you cannot help but be charmed. And unlike other design elements in the home where restraint is the usual rule, it’s a case of the more-the-merrier. Like stocking a good larder, you should always have a selection of candles to hand for an instant mood boost. There are now so many styles of candle available, from small tea lights to pillared giants, but you should select a type that is on scale with your space. The beautiful and expensive multi-wick candles are all very well if you have a generous contemporary open-planned studio, or an elegant, minimalist drawing room, but they would take over in a modest one-bedroom flat. Smaller, cheap and cheerful ones can be just as effective, especially in quantity, because no matter how much you spend on a candle you end up with the same result – a flickering flame.

Boxes of standard white household candles are a good place to start. I think it’s worth going to Ikea just for candles – they have the best selection. Just €2.99 buys you a 100 tea lights. The Ikea Fenomen set of five block candles (€7.99) looks great on a coffee table and these are a good alternative to the multi-wick candles.

Coloured candles

Though white household candles will more than suffice, ivory church candles are just that little bit classier, and one up from them is the honey-toned beeswax candle. Torc Candles (torccandles.com), a Carlow-based company has a lovely selection. Is there much of a difference between white and ivory candles you may ask? For purists it’s like the comparison between film and digital – it’s the glow. The warm colours of church and beeswax candles offer a rich compliment to the flame which you do not get with a standard white candle.

Coloured candles, especially in strong shades of green or red, can look dated and a bit cheap, particularly those that are only coloured on the outside – keep them for a themed party.

Having said that, you can break any rule, if you do it well. Years ago, I attended a supper party given by Fergus Henderson, when he was an architecture student and not yet the famous chef/owner of St John in London. His extra-long table was simply adorned with scores of white candlesticks and black candles, interspersed with huge bunches of market-fresh organic carrots (which we dipped into home-made mayonnaise). Sitting there in my black polo neck sweater – as were half the guests at the table – I thought it was the chicest thing I had ever seen. But it would work today – it all came down to the fact that he used a simple styling trick which always succeeds – one striking concept repeated en-mass. You can buy solid black candles in any size and shape from black-candles.co.uk.

Candle clusters versus singles

When it comes to candlelight, think multiples, or clusters of flames, for impact. You need to actually see the effect of the flame when applying candlelight to a room. Low surfaces such as coffee tables require votives or small lanterns – they are a mood setter and shouldn’t be too distracting. But for higher surfaces such as a shelf, console, or mantle, you can make more of an impact by playing with staggered heights and multiple candlesticks – a favourite composition frequently used by stylists and decorators. Keeping to one type of candlestick in a particular design or finish creates a unified effect. Most of us cannot afford to buy 20 antique or designer candlesticks at once, but if you want to collect, say, all glass candlesticks – you can build up a collection over time. You can mix pricey and stylish with cheap and cheerful. In a cluster, Louise Kennedy, and Galway Crystal will happily sit with some moulded glass sticks from TK Maxx. And by candlelight, few will know the difference. Mirrors and candles are a love match made in heaven, but crystal by candlelight is a full-blown fiery affair. I rarely use just one candle, but where it does work is on a wall sconce, such as the charmingly simple one (opposite)from Nordic House (£39.95/€46), nordichouse.co.uk. There is something very homely and reassuring about having a candle on a wall.

Scented candles

You may be able to cheat by buying cheap when it comes to simple flames, but low-cost scented candles are a no-no. Perfumed oil enhanced by heat is a wonderful thing, however creating a subtle background fragrance to a room requires mastery and skill. Here you really get what you pay for. A good scented candle is slow burning and delicate – not overpowering. Perfume is a subjective thing but you cannot go wrong with Diptych, Molton Brown and Jo Malone – all available at Brown Thomas and leading retailers. Don’t overdo it in the dining room though as scent can interfere with taste buds. I favour hallways for scented candles where they create a great welcome for people without enveloping them totally in vanilla or orange blossom for the whole evening.

Bathing by candlelight

The bathroom is the one room where candlelight is not used often enough. When you treat yourself to a candle light bath you will wonder why you don’t do it more often.

Bathing in the diffused light of candles is about total relaxation. Some quiet music may help, or just complete hush and tons of scented bath oil. Just make sure no one will ever knock on the door. This is the place for your favourite scented candle.

The warming flame

Blocked-up or disused fireplaces are so depressing. They leave a room with a gaping hole and a chilly reminder that people used to enjoy the room focussed on a feature which is now a blackened draughty pit. Fill them with candles and you have instant warmth.

Hallways can look and feel very cold so you could go all out by lining your stairs with tea-lights and votives. It looks especially wonderful here because of the reflective glow in the wooden panelling. Just pray some of your guests don’t come in long flowing gowns. If you are very Health and Safety conscious you can achieve a similar effect with enclosed lanterns.

Candle adhesive

If you struggle with keeping your candles straight in a candle stick or candelabra (I don’t know how many times I’ve wedged pieces of paper or matchsticks in with poor results) then the solution is candle adhesive. The type which comes in a tin, much like a shoe polish tin, where you just dip the base of your candle into the soft wax before inserting in the holder can be found on eBay. Or you use adhesive buttons (£4.75/€5.50 for four sheets of 15 buttons), from nordic house.co.uk.