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What Chemicals Are in Otherland Rattan Candles? How to Tell If Yours Burns Clean

September 09, 2026 by MBur Candle Co.

You can read the full ingredient list on an Otherland Rattan candle in about five seconds. Coconut and soy wax, a cotton wick, fragrance. Two of those you can picture. The third stands for a formula nobody outside the company has seen, and it is usually the part people react to.

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Otherland says its candles are made without parabens, phthalates, or synthetic dyes, and that its fragrance ingredients follow International Fragrance Association standards. Every one of those statements describes something the candle leaves out. None of them names what goes in. That gap is the reason we keep our beeswax candles down to a single wax with phthalate-free fragrance oil, so the list you can read is the whole list.

Start with the part of the label you can actually check

A candle has four components. Wax, wick, fragrance, and color. Three of them you can verify with your own eyes or with one clear sentence from the maker.

Wax is the biggest one by weight. Otherland uses a coconut and soy blend, which puts it in the plant-wax category rather than the petroleum category. That matters, and we will come back to why.

Color is the easiest to check. Look at the wax. If it is a shade that no plant or bee ever produced, something was added to make it that shade. Otherland states it uses no synthetic dyes, and the wax reads as an off-white cream, which lines up.

The wick you can also see. A cotton wick is the industry standard now, and it burns cleaner than the metal-core wicks that used to be common. Pinch a wick between your fingers and feel for a stiff wire down the middle. If there is one, that candle goes in the bin.

So three of four components check out on a Rattan candle. That leaves the fourth, which happens to be the one you smell.

The one word on the label doing the most work

"Fragrance" is a legal category, not an ingredient. A single fragrance oil can be built from dozens of individual aroma compounds, and a brand is allowed to list all of them under that one word. That applies to Otherland, to us, and to every candle on every shelf in the country.

Rattan is built on sandalwood, golden amber, and warm musk. Those are fragrance descriptions, not chemistry. Sandalwood in a candle is rarely distilled sandalwood, because real sandalwood oil costs more per ounce than most finished candles. Amber and musk are almost always accords, meaning several compounds arranged to read as amber or musk to your nose.

None of that makes a candle dangerous. It does mean that when your head starts to ache, you have no way to identify which compound caused it. You cannot avoid an ingredient you cannot name.

Fragrance load is the other half of it. A candle can hold a lot of fragrance oil or a little, and heavy loads throw more scent into a small room faster. Reviewers of Rattan report a scent that reads artificial to some noses and inconsistent throw to others, which is typical of a heavily loaded fragrance oil doing a lot of work in a blended wax.

It is nine at night, the good candle is going on the coffee table, and forty minutes later there is a band of pressure across your forehead. You blow it out, crack a window, and it fades within the hour. If that pattern is familiar, the fix usually starts with a lighter, simpler fragrance in a wax that burns cool and slow. Our Wine Down beeswax candle is the one we point people to first, with notes of lavender, chamomile, sage, rosemary, camphor, cedar, and sandalwood. It reads herbal and dry rather than sweet, and the 40-hour size is $32.

Why "no phthalates" answers a smaller question than you asked

Phthalates are worth avoiding. They are used in some fragrance oils to make scent hang in the air longer, and research has linked this class of compounds to hormone disruption. A brand that removes them has done something real.

Here is the limit of that promise. Phthalates are one family of compounds out of many that can sit inside a fragrance oil. Removing them says nothing about the other compounds in the blend, and it says nothing about the particles and gases released when the blend meets an open flame.

Peer-reviewed work on scented candles has found that burning them releases volatile organic compounds, including toluene and formaldehyde, along with fine particulate matter. You can read one published discussion of scented candle emissions in the National Library of Medicine archive. That research covers candles broadly, not any single brand.

Studies have also found that a meaningful share of scented candle users report symptoms such as headaches, wheezing, or eye and throat irritation. Those reports track with poorly ventilated rooms and long burn sessions more than with any one label claim.

So are the chemicals in Otherland Rattan safe?

By the specifications the brand publishes, Rattan avoids the four ingredients that cause the most trouble in candles. There is no paraffin, no metal in the wick, no added dye, and no phthalates in the fragrance. Judged against a discount paraffin candle with a colored wax and a mystery wick, it is a large step up.

What you cannot do is verify the fragrance formula, because it is not published. The brand points to IFRA standards, which are industry safety guidelines for fragrance materials. Those guidelines are real and useful. They are also self-reported, and they do not amount to independent testing of the finished candle in your living room.

So the honest answer sits in two parts. For most people, a Rattan candle burned for a couple of hours in a ventilated room is unlikely to cause a problem. For someone with asthma, migraines, seasonal allergies, or a young baby in the house, the missing fragrance disclosure is the exact information they need and cannot get. If you have a diagnosed respiratory or neurological condition, follow your doctor's guidance on scent exposure at home before you follow any candle brand's marketing copy.

That is why we stopped treating "free from" lists as the finish line. The more useful question is what the candle is made of, start to finish.

What each wax puts into the room

Paraffin comes out of crude oil refining. Crude is separated into fuels and lubricants, and the heavy waxy residue left near the end of that process is cleaned, bleached, and pressed into candle wax. Paraffin is petroleum waste, and burning it releases benzene, toluene, and formaldehyde into the room.

Soy and coconut waxes come from plants, which puts them ahead of paraffin from the start. Two things still deserve a look. Soy wax is frequently blended, sometimes with paraffin, so "soy candle" alone tells you very little. And soft plant waxes have low melting points, so they burn faster and need more fragrance oil to carry scent through a room.

Beeswax is made by bees, harvested as a byproduct of honey production, and needs no chemical processing to become candle wax. It has the highest melting point of any candle wax, which is why our 80-hour size burns for 80 hours. It is naturally hypoallergenic, and its flame throws a light spectrum closer to sunlight than any other wax. Beeswax is also the oldest candle material we know of, going back to roughly 5,000 BCE.

Wax type	Where it comes from	Processing	Burn character
Paraffin	Crude oil refining residue	Bleached and chemically treated	Releases benzene, toluene, formaldehyde; visible soot
Soy and coconut blends	Plant oils, hydrogenated	Refined; often blended with other waxes	Cleaner than paraffin; soft, lower melting point, faster burn
MBur 100% beeswax	Honeybee byproduct	Filtered only, no chemical processing	Highest melting point; 80 hours in our largest size, $65

Only the bottom row carries hard numbers, because those are our own specs and we can stand behind them.

The four things that decide how clean a candle burns

The problem with candles is ingredient-specific, and it always comes back to the same short list.

Toxic fragrance

Fragrance oils carrying phthalates or parabens are the most common source of the headache-after-forty-minutes pattern. Ask for a phthalate-free statement in writing. Ours is phthalate-free, and we say so on every candle.

Metal-core wicks

A wire in the wick keeps it standing upright in soft wax and puts metal particles into your air. Wooden wicks solve the standing-up problem with no metal at all, and they burn evenly across the melt pool.

Paraffin soot

Those grey marks above a candle on the wall are unburned petroleum. Anything landing on your paint is also landing in your lungs.

Chemical dyes

Color adds nothing to a burn. It only adds compounds that were never meant to be vaporized. Our wax is the color beeswax comes out of the hive, and nothing is added to change it.

What people notice when they switch

"Absolutely loved the Wine Down candle! The scent is so light and clean, not overpowering at all, which is exactly what I look for. A lot of other candles tend to give me headaches, but this one was a total game-changer. I was able to enjoy the calming aroma without any discomfort. It made my space feel cozy and refreshed at the same time. I'll definitely be purchasing it again. Highly recommend if you're sensitive to strong scents but still want something that smells amazing!" Nicole D.

If what pulled you to Rattan was the warm woody thing, sandalwood and amber and skin-close musk, the closest we make is Touch Grass, with notes of fig, black currant, galbanum, coconut, davana, cedarwood, amber, orris, and tonka bean. It opens green and sharp, then settles into dry wood and amber as the melt pool widens. Same territory, single-ingredient wax, wooden wick.

The checklist to run on any candle in your house

Take this to any brand, including ours.

Is the wax named as one thing, or described as a blend? One named wax is a better answer.
Does the brand say phthalate-free in writing, not just "clean"?
Is the wick cotton or wood, with no wire in the center?
Is the wax an unnatural color?
Can you find out where and by whom it was made? Ours are handmade in New York City.

MBur checks every box on that list, which is the whole reason the list exists in this form.

But mine is a nice candle from a good brand

It probably is. Otherland sits in the premium end of home fragrance alongside names like Nest New York and Diptyque, and premium brands generally have more to lose from a bad ingredient story than a supermarket label does. A coconut and soy blend with a cotton wick and no dye is a decent formulation.

The gap is disclosure, not intent. When you have a real constraint at home, a child in the room or a doctor who has told you to watch your triggers, a formula you cannot read is a formula you cannot clear.

But I have burned scented candles for years and been fine

Then keep enjoying candles. Symptoms usually show up as a combination: a heavy fragrance load, a small room, a closed door, and three or four hours of burn time. Change one of those and most people stop noticing anything.

Five habits that cut emissions no matter what you burn

Trim the wick to about a quarter inch before every single light. A long wick makes a tall flame, and a tall flame makes soot.

Keep sessions to three or four hours, then let the wax cool and reset. On the very first burn, let the melt pool reach the edge of the vessel so the candle does not tunnel.

Leave a door open or a window cracked. Ventilation does more for indoor air than any label claim.

Keep the flame away from drafts. A flickering, dancing flame is burning unevenly and putting out more particles.

If a smell in the room is bothering you, deal with the source first. A candle keeps a clean room smelling fresh, and it will not fix a full trash can. Our full walkthrough lives in The Ultimate Guide to Bee-autiful Candle Care.

Frequently asked questions

Do Otherland Rattan candles contain phthalates?

The brand states its candles are formulated without phthalates, parabens, or synthetic dyes, and that its fragrance materials follow IFRA safety standards. The complete fragrance formula is not published, so you are relying on that statement. If you want the wax side simplified too, every candle in our beeswax candle collection uses one wax and phthalate-free fragrance.

What chemicals get released when you burn a scented candle?

Burning any candle releases volatile organic compounds and fine particles. Paraffin candles release benzene, toluene, and formaldehyde. Plant waxes and beeswax burn cleaner, and the fragrance oil accounts for much of what remains. Trimming the wick and ventilating the room reduces what stays in the air.

Is a coconut soy blend safer than paraffin?

Yes. Plant waxes skip the petroleum refining chain entirely. Blends are still worth a second look, since a blend can legally include paraffin, and soft waxes burn faster than a hard wax does. A single-wax candle such as Wine Down removes that guesswork.

Can beeswax candles set off allergies?

Beeswax is naturally hypoallergenic and we use no dyes, so the fragrance oil is the only variable left. Some people believe beeswax candles help freshen indoor air, though this is not scientifically established. If you have asthma or a diagnosed allergy, follow your doctor's guidance on scent in the home.

Should I throw out the candle I already own?

No. Burn it in a ventilated room, keep sessions to three or four hours, and pay attention to how you feel. If it consistently bothers you, that candle is telling you something useful, and it is worth trying a shorter ingredient list next.

What to do next

Rattan clears the four ingredients that cause the most trouble in candles, and the fragrance formula behind its sandalwood, amber, and musk stays private. If that missing piece is what brought you here, the answer is to buy candles where the readable list is the entire list.

Start with the 40-hour Wine Down beeswax candle at $32, because it lets you test how your head feels after a full evening of burning for the price of a takeout dinner. The emotional reason is that a candle should make a room feel calmer rather than heavier. The logical reason is the math: our 80-hour size at $65 works out to about 81 cents per hour of burn time, and beeswax has the highest melting point of any candle wax, so it lasts the longest.

Customers keep telling us the same thing in different words. "They smell up a WHOLE room during the burn and even a while after blowing them out. I won't buy other candles anymore, they're just that good," wrote Paige, who owns six of our scents with her roommate.

The reason to change the candle you burn most often is straightforward: that is the one you breathe the most of.

Shop the 100% beeswax candle collection and pick your first scent.