• The Character of Home
• Explore the Townhouse
  • The Fairfax Family
  • Building the Georgian Townhouse
  • John Carr of York: Architect
  • Eighteenth-century York
  • Secrets of the Stucco
  • Cinema Days: St Georges Hall
  • Memories of St George’s Hall and Cinema
  • Silver Screen 2017
  • The Restoration
• Explore the Collection
  • Noel Terry & his Collection
  • Furniture
  • Clocks
  • Silver
  • Artworks
  • Rare historic pieces reunited
  • What is a Candlestand or Torchère?
  • Candlepower

Candlepower

If you were wealthy then beeswax candles came at a premium. For those less fortunate, or even in the recesses of a wealthy person’s bedroom, cheaper tallow candles would have sufficed. For a pair of candlestands of this rarity and quality, they would undoubtedly have been equipped with a pair of beautiful silver candlesticks, lit with the best beeswax candles that burnt cleanly and didn’t gutter (flicker), need trimming every few minutes and didn’t pong of the smell of burning animal fat.