Candles have always marked rituals, it seems: small gifts of light that dissolve darknesses both actual and symbolic, playing their part at baptisms, weddings, wakes, and funerals. For generations, candles - along with paraffin and gas lamps - had a major part in lighting our homes. And despite electricity, candles still light many a meal, or bath. The soft light of a candle is impossible to reproduce electrically. It's quintessentially a living light.
For literally hundreds of years, Rathborne candle factory, the biggest in Ireland, has been supplying Irish homes. The factory was established in 1488, and is believed to be the oldest candle manufacturer in continuous existence in Europe. Its first recorded address is at Winetavern Street. Since 1925, the company has been based at the East Wall Road. Next year, it will move out of the city, to the Blanchardstown area: traffic and property prices have prompted the move.
Some 40 people work on the premises, which consists of several large sheds and buildings. Some are now hardly used at all; full only of cold air and forgotten packets of beeswax candles wrapped in brown paper. Candle-making is a process that has changed little over the centuries, and Rathborne used 19th-century candle-moulding machines until as recently as the 1980s. "The Industrial Revolution didn't hit parts of Ireland until the 1980s," Rathborne's marketing manager Justin Kneeshaw comments.
The cavernous area where most of the candles are made is slick underfoot with layers of melted wax. "There was a manager once who used to make employees scrape the wax off the floor to be reused," Kneeshaw relates. Thankfully, people don't have to do that these days, but the refrain is still "nothing is wasted," and all the pieces pared off the tops of the candles get melted down again.
On a far wall there are a couple of huge cauldrons. They are black and hot and their contents bubble. They look exactly like the sort of vessels in which cannibals prepared their suppers. This is where the paraffin wax and beeswax gets melted down together. The ingredients used to arrive at the factory in slabs; now they come in bags of pellets and powder. The more beeswax in a candle, the longer and brighter it will burn, and the more expensive the candle. Church candles used to be 75 per cent beeswax, and the percentage of beeswax was stamped on the candle itself. Now they rarely contain more than 25 per cent, because of the cost.
Once melted, the wax is pumped into a tank, then sprayed onto a roller, like strange, hot rain. When the liquid wax hits the roller, it hardens into tiny balls, and is collected in a vat. Never has a piece of machinery resembled so gloriously a Heath Robinson picture. This wax will then be poured into machines, compressed and made into candles.
For decades, the most modern piece of equipment in Rathborne's was the piece brought in to cope with the extra demand for candles during the Eucharistic Congress in the 1930s. It is still in use, for handmade candles. Wicks are tied all around the circular top and then dipped by turn several times in the wax until they build up enough layers to make a candle. You can tell if a candle has been handmade by looking at the bottom of it: it should have rings, one for each time it was dipped, just like the rings of a tree. Some churches still use these special candles.
The church still composes some 40-45 per cent of Rathborne's business, with shrine and votive tea-lights, Pascal candles, altar candles, Advent, Easter, and Candlemas Day candles. "Some of the big churches would have an order once a week. Other places, like convents, would only need a delivery once a year." Kneeshaw says that when convents closed down recently, he was called and asked if Rathborne's would like to take back the candles they had supplied to them decades before.
"They were still wrapped in brown paper, and had dates on them." He gave a contribution and took some back for their curiosity element: there is an ad-hoc museum display in the shop on the premises, which is a pity, as much more could be made of the history and artifacts from this centuries-old factory.
Since it is unlikely there will be a shop at the premises when they move next year, and hence nowhere to display even the few things currently on display, perhaps it's time for the National Museum to come knocking on the door.
Rathborne sells "millions" of candles every year. The company's best-selling candle is a 10-inch dinner candle in red, and there has been a big increase in sales in urban areas in recent years. "People are burning candles all year round now, not just at Christmas."
In one of the warehouses, Kneeshaw scrambles around among the cobwebs, among the packets of candles wrapped in brown paper and packed away decades before. He is looking for something long-since stored. "There!" he says, triumphantly. "You won't see too many of those these days!" It's a packet of tallow candles, made from vegetable fat. "They were given to the Irish Army as part of their emergency rations. They could light them or eat them, depending on the circumstances."
Still on the food theme, if you have space in your fridge, this is the best place to store your candles. Like certain cheese and wine, the longer you keep them, the better the results. "Wax contracts when it gets cold, so the colder they're kept, the longer they'll last once they're lit." If, however, your fridge is already full of objects such as food, a cool place somewhere else in the house will do.
Rathborne have a well-stocked shop on the premises, supplied by several other candle-makers, both domestic and foreign. However, unlike most factory shops, it's not cheaper to buy there, which is worth knowing in case you make the trek specially to stock up.