Never direct heat

Beeswax punishes carelessness with heat in two distinct ways, and you need to respect both. Past eighty-five degrees Celsius the wax itself starts to discolour, its pale gold darkening toward brown even though nothing has burned yet, which is reason enough to keep a close eye on any thermometer near a melter.

Far more dangerous is what happens at two hundred and four degrees: that is beeswax's flash point, the temperature at which vapour rising off the surface can ignite before the liquid wax below it does. A scorched pot left too long over a direct flame can cross that line quickly, and once it does, you are no longer managing a melting job, you are fighting a fire.