Wine collector Penelope Wise says she first started buying Bordeaux and Burgundy out of bond because she loved seeing the wine stacked inside her home cellar. When she started traveling more, she wasn’t around to keep an eye on her home cellar as often, so she started buying wine under bond through a London merchant,…
Painting your wine cellar is deceptively easy, and can quickly turn into a nightmare. I once knew a wine fanatic who wanted to transform the extra basement space in her house into a wine bar. She started off strong, replacing the carpet with tile, buying a humidifier, and installing wine racks on the walls. At…
Famous wine writer Lettie Teague has seen some incredible wine cellars in her lifetime, some of which featured ornate chandeliers, expensive paintings, and detailed marble statues. She says, “Wine in these cellars isn’t so much consumed as it is revered. I don’t have one of those cellars. In fact, I don’t really have a cellar…
A wine collector who lived close to the New York City subway system was terrified for the safety of her wines; whenever the trains would roll by, she could see her bottles rattling in their holders. Everything else about her cellar was perfect, down to the temperature and humidity, but she wasn’t sure how well…
When wine educator Mary Gorman-McAdams decided to clean out her wine supplies a few years ago, she was horrified by what she found lurking in her apartment: entire stacks of rose, Prosecco and cheap Merlot gathering dust behind her newer bottles. She says, “I had some initial hope for the Cotes du Rhone, but alas,…
MENTIONED IN THIS POST: Bordeaux Burgundy Tuscany Nephrologist Ken Bleifer started collecting wine 50 years ago, simply because he loved the taste. By the time his collection reached 4,000 bottles, he realized he had more wine than he could possibly drink, and decided to sell a few of them off. He soon discovered that he…
Summer is just about here, and you’ve probably noticed a change in the way the strength of the sunlight. As the sun breaks through the clouds and the temperature rises, natural sunlight inches its way into the corners of your home that are normally dark and dreary all winter. This is great news for your…
Off the top of your head, how many wine retailers can you name that sell wines and offer you expert advice by phone based on your personal cellar needs? When wine collector Martha Welch bought more than 2,000 bottles of wine over the past four years, she had the benefit of a truly full-service retailer…
Forbes’ Tyler Colman set out to find the best wine app that could identify wine bottles in his cellar using only his phone’s camera. After trying a few cellar management apps, he landed on one that looked promising — until he put it to the test. The app claimed it could scan any wine bottle’s…
The first time I moved my wine collection, I thought it would be a simple process. After all, I was only moving my collection from my apartment to my new home 20 minutes away in another state. What I didn’t realize until a week before my scheduled move was that, because I was moving to…
Writer Jonathan Ray jokes that “bachelor wine merchants” make the best godparents; they pick out incredible birth year wines for their godchildren that will last two decades or more in the cellar. Ray explains that he has eight godchildren of his own, and has bought them each a case of wine as gifts when they…
When I was living in a tiny two-bedroom apartment after I graduated from college, I had to come up with creative ways to store my wine. I carved out the perfect little space in my walk-in closet (which was easily one of the biggest “rooms” in the unit). I was proud of my miniature wine…