Aliona Turcan, 32, started up Royal Candles early in 2016 but she is already seeing an increasing number of sales of her bespoke products.
Aliona (pictured), whose business is based at the Bucks Biz iCentre in Newport Pagnell, said: “I fell in love with this art more than seven years ago and for some time I researched it online. Then I became pregnant with my beautiful daughter Simona and had very little time to pursue my business dream.
“When my daughter was old enough I began looking for courses but there were none in Ireland where I was living at the time. My sister Feodara and I flew more than 5,000 km to Yekaterinburg in the Urals area of Russia to complete our training.
“The training was a full week of carving, and carving and carving some more, but besides that we enjoyed the amazing and magical Russian winter.”
The art of candle carving is big in continental Europe and Aliona is delighted with the reception she receives at events like the Ideal Home Exhibition. “People love the idea of personalised candles, with names, dates and other important words and phrases and logos and even photographs of someone special,” she said.
Bucks Biz owner Joe Muscat said: “Aliona is one of a growing number of businesses based around people doing what they love to do. We hope to support her as her business grows.”
