Canal No5? How £55 candle smells of old waterway

JEREMY CLARKSON’S nether regions and a graffiti-strewn canal lock in East London are perhaps not the first things that come to mind when you think of fragrant odours.

But those are just two of the ‘scents’ being sold to those with cash to burn in a new trend where candles are given increasingly bizarre names and descriptions.

The vogue for exciting the olfactory nerves with outlandish descriptions wafted into the public consciousness when actress-turnedwellness tycoon Gwyneth Paltrow brought out a candle called ‘This Smells Like My Vagina’ for £57 in 2020. TV presenter Clarkson then poked fun at the A-lister by hawking a £22.50 candle called ‘This Smells Like My B ******* ’ in his Cotswolds Diddly Squat Farm shop. And others are now sniffing out a sales opportunity too.

Haeckels, a Margate-based skincare and candle company, sells one called ‘Acton’s Lock’ for £55, named after the graffiti-strewn lock on Regent’s Canal, London.

It smells like ‘an overgrown lock, with bursts of moss amber and vetiver’. The company also sells a candle inspired by a graveyard.

Fragrance firm Osmology sells a ‘Concrete After Lightning’-scented candle and designer Tom Dixon’s Selfridges range includes a ‘Royalty’ candle, which smells like ‘tea time’ and ‘a 1952 Bentley’.

Consumers spent almost £420 million on scented candles between March 2021 and 2022, according to data analyst firm Kantar, and Lizzie Ostrom, a scents expert, told The Mail on Sunday the craze was far from burning out, saying: ‘It has gone very Wild West lately.’

Perfumery brand Byredo released a £1,790 ‘scent and light diffuser’ which ‘uses heat to melt the wax of Byredo candles into liquid’.

Ostrom said: ‘Candles have gone from being a passive thing that you have in the corner, to cover up a smell or to be a bit festive at Christmas, to being almost like an entertainment system in themselves.’