One of you sent us a photograph of a glass cup with the wax all gone, washed clean, with a tiny sprig of leaves picked from the balcony standing in it. You added one short line, that this cup now had a new job. We kept that photograph a very long time, because it says exactly what we hope for in a piece that leaves the workshop.
The three phrases using up, using long and using again are how we understand sustainability, at the level a small workshop can actually do rather than speak loudly about. Using up is the wax going right to the bottom with no rim of wax left clinging to the wall. Using long is every hour of burning doing its work. Using again is the cup living on after the last flame goes out.
Using up begins with the first lighting
The first time you light a candle jar, let it burn until the wax melts evenly right out to the wall of the cup. With a 200 gram cup, that stretch is usually about two hours. This stretch lays the ground for every later burn, because soy wax remembers the edge it has melted out to, and later it will melt along exactly that line.
On the burns that follow, trim the cotton wick to about five millimetres before lighting, then let the candle burn about two to three hours each round. A neat wick gives a small, even flame, the wax surface keeps its edge, and you will use right down to the last grams of wax.
When only a thin layer of wax is left at the bottom, that is when to stop. Leave that thin wax as it is, soak the cup in warm water for about ten minutes and it will lift out easily, then wash it with ordinary washing-up liquid.
The cup once the wax is gone
A washed glass cup is a pen pot, a place for a sprig of leaves, a box for pins and paper clips, or a spot for rings and necklaces beside the basin. Some of you use it for cotton buds in the bathroom, some light a tealight in the middle of it for evenings when the power is out.
The cinnamon bark and the concrete cup go another way. They have plain surfaces and real weight, so they are often kept as an ornament, holding a few pebbles brought home from a journey, or keeping some small lengths of cinnamon to scent the kitchen corner lightly. Cinnamon bark grows darker over time, and we find it more beautiful than when new.
We are doing our own part at the workshop end too. Paper boxes are of a recyclable kind, the padding favours paper over foam, the labels are printed simply. There are still some places where we are looking for a better way, and when we find it, we will change.
A few questions you often send us
How long does a 200 gram candle jar burn
About thirty-five to forty hours, depending on how you trim the wick and on the draught in the room. The 220 gram jar adds a few hours more.
How do I get all the last wax out of the cup
Soak the cup in warm water for about ten minutes; the thin layer of wax will come away from the bottom by itself, and you lift it out and wash the cup as you would an ordinary glass.
Does ZUNGZA take old cups back
For now we encourage you to give the cup a new job right there in your own home, because that is the least costly way for the environment. When we have a genuinely tidy way of taking them back, we will tell you.
You can read on the story of black marks on the wall of the cup, how to correct a candle burning lopsided, and the words just enough at ZUNGZA.