Modern Magix ritual soy candles and wax melts are designed as ready-to-use tools for intention-setting, spellwork, and everyday practice. Each candle is a fusion of scent, color, herbs, gemstones, and symbolism. Each component brings the elements of a complex ritual together in a single piece.

I created ritual candles for Modern Magix because I wanted magical tools that felt approachable and useful, without needing a long list of ingredients, specialized materials, or extensive knowledge to begin. Candles are familiar, versatile, and easy to incorporate into everyday life. This made them a natural way to bring a little magic into the ordinary.

Each candle is an intentionally crafted ritual tool, developed from my own research and personal practice, as well as a working knowledge of the relationships between its individual components. The result is a candle that can stand on its own as a focus for ritual, or become part of a larger practice.

Candles & the Element of Fire

Fire brings warmth, security, and comfort. It also conjures a wild and untamed edge—a rawness, and a certain kind of power. I think of early humans first learning how to use fire; they must have considered it magical on its own, something to be regarded with both awe and fear.

In some ritual traditions, practitioners gather representations of the elements in order to call upon their energy. Candles represent the element of fire—they literally contain it. Candles are a sort of domestication of fire. They have a pronounced presence in ritual work. I would be surprised to walk into your average metaphysical store and not find at least one candle.

Scent as Correspondence

I’ve always enjoyed burning candles for the atmosphere they provide. A warmed scent can bring to mind a sense of home just as readily as it can transport you into another place. Scent has a profound effect on the mind, especially in how it influences our memory, perception of the world around us, and overall mood. I keep this in mind when choosing fragrance during product development. Which scents conjure fall? Which are clarifying? I wouldn’t create a cleansing candle that smelled like chocolate, for example—that doesn’t fit the theme.

You probably have your own idea of what “cleansing” should smell like, or “fall” for that matter. These typically line up with the way many of us conceptualize the scents of these ideas. So scent, like herbs, has its own sort of “correspondences”—meanings and jobs we assign to it mentally.

Within my own magical philosophy, I believe that the associations people have with certain scents carry a kind of energetic power. If lots of people associate apples with fall, for example, this creates a history of intention embedded into that particular scent. I take this approach to many of the herbs and stones that I work with as well, deferring heavily to sources that have been relied on for many years to connect herbs and stones with particular intents.

Building a Ritual Tool

When I am creating a new product, my goal is to pull together multiple ingredients that one might see in a finished spell in order to create an all-in-one kind of tool. I take time to visit my pool of trusted resources to see which herbs relate to a particular concept and which stones support the energetic movement I have in mind. When building a scented product, I consider the desired vibe and draw from my own personal experiences with scent as a starting point.

I want to save my customers the trouble of combing through sources, deciding which ingredients to use, sourcing those ingredients, and finding someplace to store them. Sometimes, you just want a prosperity spell without having to go shopping. Sometimes you don’t want to buy a pound of a particular herb just to use a little pinch here and there. I remember the first time I sought to purchase herbs for a certain spell I wanted to do. I was frustrated that these hard-to-find ingredients could only be purchased in bulk, while others were simply too expensive.

I like to say that there is no right or wrong way to do rituals or magic. I offer my style of it here in the products I create. These are but an interpretation of information that I have compiled, and my particular approach to an intent.

Do you need any of these things in order to do a ritual? Of course not. But the experience of lighting a candle and inhaling a scent certainly shifts one into a particular frame of mind. I like to think of these candles as ways to shift the brain into place—to be mindful, to practice ritual, to cast a spell. I layer herbs and gemstones with fragrance to add more voices singing the same song—more pieces to reinforce an intent to work with you as you work magic.

The sigils on the labels are like my own magical signature, my offering to you. They are a personal way for me to reach out and assist you with this intention. They are my intention captured in writing—in the language of magic and energy. It is my way of further distilling the intent of the product. Herbs and stones have a myriad of uses; this is my way of assigning them a specific task. 

Materials Matter

When choosing materials for Modern Magix products, I balance affordability with sourcing materials that are safe for regular use, gentler on the environment, and reliable in the finished product. My top priority is not maximizing profit, and I keep my prices as low as I can while still sustaining the business.

Our soy wax products are crafted from an all-natural, vegan wax sourced from 100% renewable, vegetable-based materials. Soy wax offers an alternative to the petroleum-based waxes that dominate much of the mainstream candle market, with less soot during burning and a longer, smoother burn when properly formulated. Choosing a high-quality wax is one of the ways I prioritize both performance and the experience of using the finished candle.

We also made an intentional choice to use fragrance oils rather than essential oils in our scented products. There has been a large movement toward using essential oils to fragrance candles, but essential oils are not automatically the better choice simply because they are natural. Their safety and performance depend heavily on how they are used, and many essential oils do not perform well when burned in candles. Some can lose their scent, develop an unpleasant fuel-like smell, or cause unpredictable behavior during production and use. Essential oils can be wonderful when used appropriately, such as topically when properly diluted or in a diffuser designed for them, but they are not the right fragrance material for every application.

The fragrance oils we use are considered “clean scents” by our supplier. They are formulated without phthalates, carcinogens, mutagens, reproductive toxins, organ toxins, acute toxins, or ingredients that would require a Prop 65 warning in California. More importantly for our purposes, they are formulated for use in products that are intended to burn and provide a consistent, long-lasting fragrance experience.

When choosing herbs to garnish our candles, we avoid plant species that are at risk from overharvesting. We especially avoid ingredients that are sacred to traditions we are not a part of, such as White Sage and Palo Santo, so that our products do not contribute to the demand for rapidly overharvested materials (one clarification: the fragrance we use called “Palo Santo & Sandalwood” contains no actual Palo Santo wood).

The Ritual Candle Collections

The Wheel of the Year

Modern Magix’s first collection of candles followed the seasonal shifts of the Wheel of the Year. The Wheel has eight spokes: the Summer and Winter Solstices, the Spring and Fall Equinoxes, and four cross-quarter days that fall between them. Each seasonal observance carries its own traditions and associations, drawn from a variety of cultures and practices.

The Wheel of the Year collection grew from my interest in using the natural world as a guide for ritual. Each collection is inspired by and built around the season itself. I considered the foods, plants, weather, celebrations, and general feeling of that time of year when developing each candle. Samhain brings pumpkin, bonfire, and darker mystical notes; Yule evokes evergreen, warming spices, and winter comforts; the spring collections have flowers, fresh growth, and renewal; and the harvest festivals bring fruit, baking, abundance, and the changing landscape.

While the Wheel of the Year was an important early influence on Modern Magix, I don't personally observe every one of these festivals today. Now, I tend to notice the seasonal shifts in a much more local and immediate way: when the lilacs begin blooming, the ripening of wild blueberries, the foliage turning, or the arrival of the first frost. That relationship with the changing landscape continues to influence how I approach seasonal ritual.

Lunar Rituals

My approach to lunar ritual has changed considerably over the years. In the earlier days of Modern Magix, I offered thirteen different candles corresponding to the Full Moons of the year - known as Esbats within Wiccan practice. However, as I researched for this collection, I became increasingly uncomfortable with the way many of these Moon names were presented as a single, generalized "Native American" tradition. The names and associations varied tremendously without specific cultural or regional context.

Rather than continue with a collection built on that oversimplification, I discontinued the line and went back to the drawing board.

The Moon itself remains an important framework for ritual because it is visible wherever we live. Within my personal practice, I approach lunar ritual through the movement of the Moon rather than assigning each month a particular name. The New Moon represents a beginning: a time for planting seeds, setting intentions, and considering what we want to draw toward ourselves. The Full Moon brings illumination and culmination, while the waning light lends itself naturally to release, cleansing, and banishment.

The current New Moon and Full Moon candles reflect this approach, using scent, herbs, and gemstones to support these different movements of energy.

Cleanse & Purify

Most of my early candle offerings centered around particular times of year, but ritual doesn't require waiting for a particular date. Sometimes you simply feel the need to cleanse your space, protect yourself, or shift the energy around you.

Cleansing is one of the foundational forms of ritual I see across different magical traditions, so creating a Cleanse & Purify candle felt like a natural addition to the collection. These candles combine herbs traditionally associated with cleansing, with Citrine stones which are often used for transforming or redirecting energy.

I'm interested in expanding this kind of everyday ritual work into additional intention-based candles for things like prosperity, protection, luck, success, and ancestor work. My beeswax intention candles have already begun exploring some of these ideas in a different format.

Zodiac Collection

In recent years, my own practice has become increasingly influenced by astrology. Astrology is much more complicated than simply knowing your Sun Sign.  Your birth chart contains planets, houses, aspects, degrees, and all sorts of other layers that offer a more personal picture of personality and life experiences. Translating all of that complexity into a product line would be quite a project, so the Modern Magix Zodiac Collection begins with the twelve Sun Signs.

These candles are designed both to celebrate each sign and to offer support where I think that sign might benefit from it. Herbs and gemstones were chosen based on their relationship to the sign, or areas I wanted to offer assistance with. Each candle's pair of words identifies an aspect of that sign, and the kind of support the candle offers.

The sigils combine each sign's traditional symbol with its planetary ruler, along with additional elements specific to the intention of the candle. Even the fragrances are connected: signs sharing an element begin with the same base fragrance, which is then combined with a second fragrance to give each sign its own character.

Of course, you don't need to be a particular Sun Sign to work with one of these candles. You might choose your Rising or Moon Sign, a sign that appears prominently in your birth chart, or simply connect with the words and intention attached to a particular candle. As with all of my work, there is no single "right" way to use these tools. They are my interpretations, offered for you to incorporate into your own practice.

Choosing a Format

I strive to make my work as accessible as I can to a variety of folks, which led me to develop the ritual candle offerings in different sizes and formats. These options offer slightly different ways of experiencing our products.

Our black tins are durable, portable, and easy to store between uses. The lidded containers help contain the wax and fragrance, and the metal construction won't shatter if accidentally dropped. These 8 oz tins also have a larger diameter, making them particularly well suited to filling a room with fragrance.

The glass pillar candles (also commonly referred to as 7-day, prayer, or vigil candles) have a more traditional ritual presence. Their larger format and prominent sigils make them especially suited to an altar or dedicated ritual space. The Wheel of the Year candles also incorporate poetry into their labels that one can meditate on during use.

For those who cannot or do not want to burn candles, our wax melts offer another way to experience the scents, colors, and intentions of the candle lines. The wax melts contain the same fragrance and herbal elements as their corresponding candles. This preserves the original intention behind the tool, even without a candle flame. Once melted, the wax becomes its own little potion within the "cauldron" of a wax warmer.

Using a Modern Magix Ritual Candle

I have said before that you don't need a tool at all to perform a ritual, but tools can help focus your energy. I think of all the components of my work as "helpers" to the intention of the candle.

I've spent a great deal of time researching herbs, scents, stones, colors, and symbolism to bring them together within these candles. My hope is that this makes more complex ritual work accessible without requiring you to spend hours tracking down ingredients, researching their correspondences, and figuring out how to bring them together.

Sometimes you just want to do a prosperity spell without having to go shopping.

The simplest way to work with one of these candles is to light it with your intention in mind. I often suggest meditating on your desired outcome and writing it down while the candle burns. This gives you a way to add your own signature to the work.

From there, you can make the ritual as simple or elaborate as you like. You might set up an altar filled with symbols related to your intention, incorporate herbs or other ritual tools, or simply light the candle and allow yourself a few moments of focused attention.

There is no required process. The candle is there to help you create the space for your own practice.

A Little Magic for the Everyday

I want complex, layered ritual work to feel within your grasp. You don't need a cabinet full of ingredients or years of experience to begin; magic can start with something as simple as lighting a candle and deciding what you want to make space for.

Modern Magix is a ritual tool creation business, but it is also my art and my magic, condensed into something you can bring into your own home. My hope is that these tools give you a little more confidence, a little more focus, and perhaps a real witch in your corner as you find your own way through your practice.