Even the box had to leave no trace.
For years, I lived in a Toronto condo where garbage performed a convenient disappearing act. I opened the chute, dropped in the bag, closed the door—and never thought about it again.
Then I moved to a cottage...
Suddenly, garbage did not disappear. It waited for me.
Every transparent bag had to be loaded into the car and driven 12 kilometres to the landfill. The bags were counted, and if I brought more than eight, I had to pay extra. Apparently, even garbage has a cover charge.
From late fall until May, the landfill was open for four glamorous hours—from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.—when normal people are usually at work. If I arrived too late, the garbage came home with me and had to be secured inside metal bins so animals could not reach it.
Nothing makes you reconsider your purchasing habits quite like driving home with the same garbage you had just driven 12 kilometres to remove.
I began planning my life around landfill hours.
I can laugh about it now, but at the time, it was not always funny. Cottage life taught me that everything we bring into our homes eventually asks something of us—space, care, effort or a trip to the landfill.
Then there were the Amazon boxes.
They seemed to reproduce when I wasn’t looking. I removed the tape, plastic and labels, placed the cardboard outside, and let the snow and rain work their magic. But every new delivery brought another box, followed by another decision about what to do with it.
For the first time, I understood that throwing something “away” does not mean it goes away. It simply becomes someone—or somewhere—else’s problem.
It was shocking to see how much waste one household could produce.
Beautiful for ten seconds. Left behind for much longer.
When I began designing PureBee packaging, I fell in love with the glamorous boxes: shiny paper, metallic details, perfect ribbons. They were beautiful—but many combined paperboard with plastic film, foil and glue, making them difficult to recycle.
That did not feel very PureBee.
I wanted a box people would not need to throw away—or carefully interrogate before approaching the recycling bin. I wanted something they would genuinely choose to keep.
A small botanical plot twist.
That search led me to bamboo.
Bamboo looks like wood, but it is actually a grass. While commercial timber is generally grown over decades, many useful bamboo species can mature in approximately three to five years. Once established, bamboo produces new stems from beneath the ground without requiring the entire plant to be replanted.
Fast-growing grass with the confidence of a tree. I liked it immediately.
And that is how the PureBee bamboo box was born.
Nothing was designed for only one moment.
Inside, there is no disposable foam waiting to become your next landfill problem. Instead, each candle is protected by a classic napkin made from 100% French linen.
Unwrap your candle. Wash the linen. Invite someone to dinner—or eat something lovely by yourself without sharing. Then keep the bamboo box for jewellery, photographs, letters, candle tools, keepsakes, or the mysterious little objects every home somehow collects.The candle brings beauty into your home. The linen finds a place at your table.
Designed to be kept. Made to be reused.
Because beauty should leave no trace.