The Joel Nolan brand literally started in my kitchen one December night in 2016. I had an itch to do something creative and decided to follow my love of smells. Ordered a candle making kit from Amazon and 2 days later, I’m in the kitchen cooking up some wax and mixing oils to create fragrances.
There was something so relaxing about melting wax, mixing the fragrances, pouring it and seeing it progress from liquid to a fully settled candle. With this new found passion, I decided I wanted to create a product that is simply an extension of me, Joel Nolan.
The scents that I put into the candles needed to be inspired by people and places that have in someway impacted my life. So I did just that. After much searching I finally found 3 foundation fragrances.
Fragrance one is called ‘Maverick’ - Why Maverick? Well, I had some candle samples sitting on my coffee table and my nephew, Maverick, who at the time was 18 months old and walking around like crazy discovered the candles. He grabbed this one specific candle and put it right up to his face in the cutest and most aggressive way and breathed in deeply 2 times. He put the candle down, took 3 steps away and turned right around, grabbed the candle and did the same thing. This specific candle will forever remind me of this moment.
Fragrance two is called ‘191 Sutter’ - This is the address to a hotel in San Francisco my love and I stayed at after spending a weekend in Napa Valley. Interestingly enough, our 3rd was to a wedding so this weekend the pressure was on. The wedding was a success, so we treated ourselves with a night in San Francisco at the Galleria Park Hotel. You know how every hotel has a scent? Well, this one had a very pleasant citrus type smell. While searching for scents, I came across this oil that simply put me in the memory of that weekend. It has a nice orange note with a bit of flower dropped in it.
Fragrance three is called ‘Chatsworth’ - This is the more masculine smelling candle of the line. When I was 13 years old I would skateboard every single day and my friends and I would skate at a school named Chatsworth Elementary in New York. We would stay out there until 11-12 midnight clearly breaking curfew because we thought we were grown men. Why is it a masculine scent? The candle is carefully blended with a Tobacco fragrance and L’Homme. This blend provides a potent yet pleasant aroma that always takes me back to the days when I was a kid thinking I was a man. (I finally told my parents that I broke curfew since they never caught me. I did this when I couldn't get in trouble anymore.)
Fragrance four which will be release a little while after the original 3 will be called ‘Nilsa’ - Nilsa was my mothers name and she was a small woman with the presence of a giant. Powerful in so many ways and I wanted to put together a candle that was soft but powerful at the same time matching my mothers giant spirit. This scent will have a blend of sandalwood & oak. Stay tuned for the final blend.