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It’s a common encounter that will stop most of us in our tracks. You’re casually milling about life when you suddenly catch a whiff of something — something good, something familiar — and you immediately travel back in time to when that whiff first wafted across your nose. Grandma’s spice cake, the seats on your older brother’s first car, Dad’s deodorant, or even the mane on your favorite My Little Pony.
How is it that our olfactory receptors seem to have an express track to our memories? Turns out, all the emotional warm fuzzies we get from that sudden nostalgic blast is just big brain science, people.
Smell-activated nerve signals register in the olfactory bulb first, a part of the brain closest to the nose. Next, they travel to the piriform cortex which interprets the nerve signals into smell and then to the amygdala, our emotional center. If that emotional center reacts strongly, the nearby hippocampus, where memories are formed, will be triggered next. Sense of smell cues are stronger because they travel straight to the amygdala, entirely bypassing the thalamus, where sight, sound and touch signals get hung up.
For Astleigh Hill of Christiansburg, it was the science part, melted with a little bit of her own memories and several drops of divine timing, that motivated a significant professional jump.
Hill grew up in Giles County and graduated from Virginia Tech having studied psychology and professional writing. She met her husband, Pete, a Hokie engineer, in school. When it came time to have children (three in total), she pivoted away from full-time work to full-time mom.
The Transition to Mom
“The transition is massive … figuring out who you are now … I needed a creative outlet for myself. I love design, I love to be creative, and traditions are very important to me,” Hill relates.
Traditions were an integral part of Hill’s wonder years. Her favorite was hunting for and subsequently tagging the family Christmas tree weeks before it was time to bring it home. Likewise, she wanted to instill a foundation of tradition in her own family. She got to work right in her own kitchen, over a double boiler, trying not to burn anything important, and started making candles.
Candles checked both of Hill’s boxes: They can be something aesthetically pleasing in your home (creative design), and their fragrance would be a backdrop to memory making (tradition).
“If those smells are burning and wafting about while you’re in the middle of doing something or just in a moment, it would give my kids those particular notes. And as adults, if they came across those same fragrant notes, it would trigger their childhood.”
The Transition to Entrepreneur [+ Mom]
She started an online marketplace to sell and ship her candles from home, but she always envisioned the candles as a steppingstone to something bigger – an intentionally, beautifully-designed retail storefront with space to expand beyond candle wares to home décor items. In January of 2022, Hill took ownership of a rundown 1930s building on North Franklin Street in Christiansburg that was originally a two-car auto mechanic’s shop. After an entire year of renovations, handled by her engineer-turned-moonlighting-carpenter husband, The Chandlerie opened its doors in May of 2023. The name comes from the word “chandler,” meaning a professional candle-maker.
A farmhouse table takes up half of the store and is the site for bookable candle pouring workshops. The other half is lined with shelves of thoughtfully arranged home décor and kitchenware items sourced from other small creators across the country, from simple syrups and oven mitts, to puzzles and earrings. Outside, a small patio area lit by string lights can be reserved for private, smaller, intimate gatherings.
The heart of the shop is the candle library, which is where workshop participants pick their fragrance, or shoppers pick their favorite poured candle. Each candle from the current collection (which changes seasonally or thematically) is covered by a cloche, or glass dome. To smell test the candles, pick up the cloche and smell inside it. Between candles, the smell of coffee beans or your own clothes will reset your sniffers.
Much like wine tasting, Hill provides you with a card that lists all candles by number for notetaking. If you have trouble making a final decision, you can fill out a candle library card to archive your favorites, which also purposefully recalls the non-electronic card catalogs of yesteryear. One side lists your candle purchase history and on the other, your candle wish list. So, if you’re forgetful, you’re taken care of, or if crazy Aunt Joan wants to “do good” this year with a present you actually want, you’re set there, too.
Hills candles are made of natural soy wax and feature a 100% wooden wick (read: that fun, audible crackle). Her fragrance oils are phyllite and paraben free. When taken care of properly, including trimming the wick before each burn and letting the first burn melt the entire top surface, the candle should last at least 78 hours.
“It’s funny the things you tie to certain moments, something you may not even think about, but it’s creating a cool connection and creating a space that feels really special,” Hill states. She set out to design a space — and offer a curated experience with a nostalgic feel within that space — that didn’t exist anywhere else nearby. And with the genesis of The Chandlerie, perhaps she created a New River Valley tradition in the process.
Nancy S. Moseley is a writer from Blacksburg and a big fan of nostalgia. This usually leads her to smell all sorts of things that normal people won’t smell. Most recently a Koosh Ball = field trip to D.C. with 8th graders.
