Annick Goutal || Luxury Noel Festive Candle

It's definitely candle season guys. Candles make the perfect gift as well as being the perfect luxurious treat, as a mum to little boys I definitely feel that candles give me a time-out and I rarely get shoppers guilt when splurging on them as we all benefit from them being in our home. They make me feel house proud, happy and calm too. I adore all scent products especially a good perfume but the same rings true for candles - a good candle filled with gorgeous notes such as woods, earthy resins, blackcurrant (in autumn and winter rather than summer), tonka, mandarin and orange and cinnamon are by far my favourite and are an excellent way to fill your home and your life with scent.

As far as design goes I like my candles to look good especially because they are used in place of ornaments in my house. You can't containers with metallic touches and simplistic labelling. I'm not a huge fan of coloured waxes and I will always opt for waxes that contain no nasties or synthetics where possible. I love Yankee Candles as do many people but these are my average buy candles, the labelling lends themselves to being average but, candles that have rose golds, gold tones and silvers automatically make me feel like I've really treated myself. I know it's silly especially as a good candle is based on scent and what it's made of but I can't shake the need to judge my ~~books~~ candles by their ~~covers~~ look.

My latest candle addition is the Annick Goutal Noel Candle for 2015. This was another candle that was received before we moved two weeks back, again I didn't want to break it out before in fear of it breaking in transit or being scratched mid-move.

There are a few Noel Annick Goutal Noel candles which vary in design but this is the latest one. The glass tumbler is thick and heavy which is deceptive because I presumed it would be just like any other standard candle tumbler. The design is made up of the Annick Goutal monogrammed initials and matching stripes in a gold-tone and the candle holds 175 g of wax which apparently burns for around 40 hours.

The Noel candles scent is made up of Siberian Pine, Orange, Mandarin and Citrus natural notes. Cold sniff this candle hits you with gorgeous resinous forest pine notes. The orange, mandarin and citrus notes come into play once you've sniffed and walked away as they sit delicately in the background taking the acid edge of the pine notes and warming the whole scent.

Once lit, the warmth amalgamates the resinous pine and the bright citrus notes. The result is a beautiful but unique scent that's both warming and wintery. It doesn't sound like a typical Christmas scent but like the Neom Perfect Peace candle (link) this is definitely seasonal. The brand describes it as:

''the clarity of snow and the warmth of a house filled with impatient, excited children on Christmas Eve''

While that's a bit of an OTT statement I would completely agree with the outside snow and the inside warmth parts - this is the perfect example of a candle that brings the outdoors and indoors together in one candle.

It's expensive but then aren't all luxury treats. For me candles hold the same appeal as any branded fragrance product, the difference being is that I'm deciding to make my house rather than myself smell gorgeous. My sons even enjoy a good candle being lit in the living room and they have preferences over which scents we should buy. They weren't completely sold on this scent because it smells too ''perfume like'' (their words not mine) and especially because they're more into foodie and citrus scents but I personally love the complexity of this scent.

You can purchase this candle from quite a few places but Amazon seems to be the cheapest place with it being sold for £13 under the RRP, I love to give gifts but I also love to save money, £13 is a pretty amazing saving in my opinion.