Burning Through My Moods

But look at what I'm burning, and the answer will be clear.

The Focus Burn

When I need to get something accomplished — like crossed off the list, complete — I reach for something clean and crisp. Something that says pay attention to what you’re doing, not what you’re smelling. So, no florals, nothing warm or indulgent – the purpose is to clear the air and clear my mind simultaneously.

North End or The Island are my go-tos.  Both with a scent structure that’s smells like focus -— green, bright, slightly outdoorsy – and never complicated. They smell like the world is full of possibility.

I light one of these and I mean business.

The Unwind

The work day is done. The laptop is closed and Chomper’s been fed, now, it’s time to exhale and contemplate what’s next.

This is the moment for something mellow and clean — not demanding, not complex. Something that simply makes the room feel easier to be in.

Reef Road is what gets the flame. Crisp, coastal, slightly briny. It smells like the best version of a Florida evening when the sun dips, the air finally cools the only place left to be is where I want to be. It doesn't ask anything of you. It just shows up and makes everything a little better.

Sheer perfection.

The Celebration

Company is coming. The table is set. The glasses are already chilled, and the playlist is begging for volume.

Palm Beach Nights is lit for entertaining — rich, warm, sophisticated. It fills a room the way good conversation does, without trying too hard. When I’m in that more festive state of mind, Island Holiday brings the joy and the spice.

Both say: Come in for a minute, stay for the scent.

The Private One

Every collection has that one scent that feels almost too good to share.

Mine is Cold Snap.

It's smoky and herbal and woody — clove, amber, sandalwood, patchouli, the kind of warmth that has real depth to it. In Palm Beach, the smell of wood smoke drifting through a tropical neighborhood is rare and fleeting and almost startling in the best possible way.

I burn this one when it's just me. No company, no agenda. Just the crackle of the wood wick and something that smells like winter in a place that doesn't really have one.

It was my first scent and it’s still brilliant. And still all mine.

The Comfort Burn

Here's the thing about hard days: you can sit in them or you can do something about them.

When I'm sad or struggling or just need to reset — I reach for Veranda. Clean, green, lemon verbena and jasmine and cedar. And yes, I'm aware of the symbolism. When life hands you lemons, I literally reach for the lemon candle.

But there's real logic underneath the joke. Veranda smells like the future. Like open doors and fresh air and the unbridled optimism of a morning that hasn't been touched yet. It doesn't wallow. It lifts.

When you need to find the lemons and make lemonade — Veranda is where I start.

The Morning Ritual

I come home from my four-mile walk, in that morning state of mind – full of sunrise and gratitude and the flutter of beginning a new day — clear, quiet, and not yet claimed by the inbox or the phone.

Here is where I reach for Snowbirds.

Lavender, eucalyptus, bayberry, pine. It's reminiscent of a cold morning walking in the woods with the frost heavy on the ground — which is exactly the feeling I'm trying to hold onto before Florida remembers it's Florida and the heat sets in.

It's my transition scent. The bridge between the walk and the work. Between the outside and the inside. Between the person I am at 6am and the one the day will ask me to be.

This is where Breathe In What You Love came into existence.

The One For Her

My mother loves jasmine. And roses. And gardenias — the way they spill over a Palm Beach garden wall and announce themselves before you've even arrived.

When I visit her - daily, I light Lake Trail without thinking about it.

Gardenia, tuberose, jasmine, lemon. It smells like everything she has always loved about this island — lush, generous, unapologetically floral. It smells like her, somehow. Like the version of Palm Beach she raised me in.

She may not remember the details anymore. But she knows when something smells right.

And Lake Trail always smells right.

The Mood Shifter

Cocktail Hour makes me genuinely happy. Not content, not calm — happy. There's a difference.

Amaretto, dark rum, Madagascar vanilla, butter and cream. It smells fun and flirty, like a great rum drink on a warm evening when everything is going right and you know it. It shifts something in the room — and in me — almost immediately.

At the end of the day, people are deeply conscious of scent. So you instinctively know when something smells wrong and, conversely you know when something smells exactly right.

But when you reach for that particular scent? That part is subconscious. Nobody is thinking in that moment: I am sad, therefore, I require lemon verbena. They just find themselves standing in front of the collection, picking something up, putting it down, picking up another — until one of them feels like the answer.

The nose knows before the brain does.

That's what makes fragrance different from every other sensory experience. You don't decide how something smells. You just feel it.

So. What are you burning today?

Whatever the answer — we have a scent for that moment. Not sure what your scent is?  Find You Scent here.

Shop the full collection at shop.chezsheacustom.com

Breathe In What You Love.