A Danish Christmas with VERDEN Founder, Charlotte Semler
There is a quiet beauty to the way VERDEN founder Charlotte Semler celebrates jul – the Danish Christmas. Charlotte has long believed that scent has the power to shape how a home feels, and her own Christmas is rooted in nature, candlelight and the evocative scents of winter: simple rituals that bring warmth, togetherness and a sense of home.
Growing up between the beaches and countryside of Denmark, jul was marked by afternoons spent gathering evergreen branches from the garden, baking traditional family recipes scented with cinnamon and clove, and lighting candles as darkness fell. “Christmas has always been about how a home feels,” says Charlotte. “The scent, the light and the people you share it with are what create the memories.”
Those childhood traditions still shape the way she celebrates today. Fresh evergreen foliage is layered throughout her home, candles glow from morning until night, and fragrance is considered as carefully as every decorative detail.
The scent that inspired Festivum
It is this sensory approach to Christmas that inspired VERDEN’s seasonal FESTIVUM candle. Hand-poured using natural vegetable wax and fragranced with 100% natural essential oils, it blends forest cedarwood and pine with warming notes of cinnamon, clove, ginger lily, nutmeg and black pepper, capturing the atmosphere of a Scandinavian winter.
“For me, Christmas always begins with scent. Every year my family bakes traditional Danish Christmas cookies, and the moment the cinnamon, cloves and warming spices fill the kitchen, I know the festive season has arrived. Those aromas are woven into my childhood memories and are still the scents that instantly make me feel at home. They became the inspiration for FESTIVUM, where those same warming spices are layered with fresh pine and cedarwood to capture the feeling of a Danish Christmas.”
Go big with a foraged festive wreath
“One of my favourite Christmas traditions is making an oversized wreath and a simple pine swag for the mantel using foliage gathered from the garden. The beauty is in the scale – you don’t need perfect floristry or lots of decoration. Fresh evergreen branches instantly fill the room with that unmistakable scent of Christmas, and I love enhancing it with the soft glow and warming fragrance of a candle as evening falls. Together, they create a home that feels cosy, welcoming and connected to nature.”
“Finish with a few touches of aged brass or gold, and let the simplicity speak for itself. Scandinavian decorating is all about restraint – the more natural it feels, the more beautiful it becomes.”
Create a table lit entirely by candlelight
“You can never have too much candlelight at Christmas. I like to mix tall taper candles in different heights to create movement and warmth across the table, then weave simple sprigs of seasonal foliage down the centre instead of an elaborate floral arrangement. A little fir tucked into each napkin is such an easy detail, and one beautifully scented candle in the middle of the table completes the scene.”
“For me, the table should feel relaxed and inviting – the flicker of candlelight, the scent of evergreen and warm spices, and touches of brass or gold are all you need. It’s the atmosphere around the table that people remember long after the meal has finished.”
About FESTIVUM
Top notes: cinnamon, clove, ginger lily. Middle notes: nutmeg, black pepper. Base notes: cedarwood, pine. A vegetable wax candle with 100% natural fragrance, vegan and cruelty free, in fully recyclable packaging.
