Gwyneth Paltrow has had a long and wildly successful career, including her Oscar-winning performance in Shakespeare in Love. In recent years Paltrow has largely stepped away from acting, instead focusing on her wellness brand Goop. She recently opened up about the origins of their infamous vagina-scented candle, and why she kept it on the site after basically breaking the internet.
Goop’s Vagina-scented candles have made headlines over the years, and they say any publicity is good publicity. But the origins behind this Goop product are pretty coincidental and funny. A clip from Mind Valley’s Instagram shows her speaking at the Manifesting Summit, where she revealed how that infamous product came together. In her words:
That product is so fascinating. We were messing around with different scents one day and I smelled something and I was like ‘Oh that smells like… you know.’ I was joking. And then he was like ‘Oh we should make that a candle and put it on the site.’
While The Goop Lab (which is streaming with a Netflix subscription) showed Paltrow at work, the origins of the vagina candle were not included in its episodes. And it turns out that the infamous product came about basically by accident. During the same panel, she 52 year-old actress and business woman offered more context about that candle, saying:
And I thought he was kidding and I was like ‘Yeah definitely. That sounds like a winner right there.’ And then all of a sudden it was on the website. And then we broke the internet again. And then it took us a long time to live that one down.
She’s not wrong. The vagina candle is arguably the most well-known of Goop’s projects, and it likely took some work for that not to be synonymous with the company. But you can’t deny that the wellness brand was the name on everyone’s lips when the candle went viral.
While Paltrow hopes to sell Goop one day, she’s got a strong vision for the company. She explained why she decided to keep the vagina-scented candles on the site after it went viral, saying:
I kept it on the site because there is an aspect to women’s sexuality that I think we’re socialized to feel a lot of shame. And I sort of loved this kind of punk rock idea. We are beautiful and we are awesome and go fuck yourself.
While Paltrow forgot she was in Spider-Man: Homecoming, her memory is strong regarding the work she’s done at Goop. And she wanted to use the viral candle to help destigmatize the female body. And as such, we’ve seen multiple vagina-scented candles hit the market from the company.
Paltrow has a few projects expected as part of the 2025 movie release list, including her movie Marty Supreme opposite Timothée Chalamet.