How To Repurpose Candle Jars from Bath and Body Works

Hey everyone! So if you have caught any bit of drift from this blog, you probably know that I'm obsessed with candles, specifically, Bath and Body Works candles. They burn for a decent amount of time, the smells are so strong and accurate to the description, and they are always coming out with new scents and collections! The jars that the candles come in are really big and they are AMAZING once cleaned out, you can repurpose them for multiple things. The candles leave about a half inch of wax at the bottom, so today I'm going to show you how to clean that wax out and make your candle jar clean and ready for repurposing!

There are multiple ways you can do this, but I believe this is the easiest way!

Oh, and let's just look past the chipped nail polish in this blog post, I'm not proud...

STEP ONE:
Put your candle in the freezer. I let mine sit in the freezer overnight, but it really only needs 4 hours or so. I put my candle inside a large ziplock baggie so that it didn't smell up my freezer, but I don't believe it would have anyway.

STEP TWO:
Once your candle is out of the freezer, you need to get a good work space on the counter and a butter knife. You will want to create a few "stabs" in the wax, it takes a good push since the wax is frozen, but just make sure your candle is on a flat surface and you are holding onto it firmly with the other hand.

After a few stabs, you should see that the wax starts breaking apart into pieces on it's own. To ensure that my wax was breaking apart, I would insert my butter knife, and twist it a little to crack the wax. After you have created a few cracks in the wax, it will be able to be picked up with your fingers and removed with no problem! 

STEP THREE:
Once you have removed all of the wax, you will be left with an empty candle jar (maybe a little wax residue left over), and the labels.

The front label (of a Bath and Body Works candle), should peel off with no problem. The bottom label is a little harder to get off, so start by just peeling whatever peels off on it's own.

STEP FOUR:
After you have removed as much of the label as you can, make your way over to your nearest sink. You want to use warm water, but be cautious that hot water on frozen glass can often bust glass. It doesn't need to be boiling hot, and your candle should have warmed up a bit by now, but be cautious. Run your candle under the warm water, and you can either peel off the remaining with your fingers, or use your butter knife to gently scrape the remaining label off.

If you are still left with some sticky residue after this step, then you can go in with a cotton ball and some nail polish remover, or vinegar. Either of those will remove the remaining sticky residue with no problem! After all of your label is completely removed, and the sticky residue is gone, feel free to give your jar a good wash with warm water and soap!

STEP FIVE:
Repurpose! That's it, you're done! You can lay your jar out to dry, or hand dry it with a towel and it is immediately ready to repurpose it. The possibilities are endless, they make really great makeup brush holders, organization for the bathroom (q tips, cotton balls), toothbrush holder, and so much more! I am actually using mine to hold my favorite lip products that often get lost in my makeup drawers and I'd like them to have their own special spot.

Wondering what the black stripes on mine are? My mom has an Etsy Shop where she makes Vinyl wedding signs and decals, so she made me two quick black stripes to help mine match my bedroom. You can decorate it with glitter, paint, stickers, or just leave it clear!

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, I enjoyed writing it!

As always, thanks for reading
xoxo, Jaimie