Candle making (recycling)

Last Sunday we made candles from recycled rests of candle wax. First we sorted the wax by colour. We melted the wax in a double boiler (im Wasserbad), in tins that we placed in pots of boiling water on the stove. Soon we had red, yellow, white, orange, brown and blue wax in liquid. By mixing red and blue we created purple; from blue and yellow we made green. Meanwhile we prepared new candle wicks (Dochte) and mounted them in the centre of improvised plastic and cardboard molds (Gussformen). Finally we cast the hot wax into the molds, in layers of different colour, letting each layer cool before the next one.

We -- that was Barbara, Sarah, Lisa and yours truly. It was really a messy job, but we had good fun! And each homemade candle is completely unique.

Update: Barbara observed that what we did was actually upcycling.