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the
wineanorak's guide to [Editors note: this is an updated version of an article originally published in Decanter magazine in February 2004] While
the unusually hot summer of 2003 was welcomed by sun worshippers, it
was a nightmare for wine lovers without temperature-controlled
storage for their wines. Anyone keeping their collection at home
without a proper cellar or controlled storage conditions will have
risked cooking their precious bottles as the temperatures soared to
record levels across the UK. If
you are one of the unlucky ones whose wine was warmed in this way,
how much damage, if any will have been done? It’s hard to say.
Despite the importance of this subject to the wine trade, there’s
an almost complete lack of proper scientific studies on the effects
of different storage conditions. All we have are anectdotal
observations, and educated guesswork from how heat and light affect
chemical reactions in general. Consequently, it’s just not
possible to say how much damage exposing a case of 1996 Lafite is
going to be done by letting it sit at a temperature of 35 ºC for a
week. What
we do know is that wine ages superbly in the sorts of conditions
found in underground cellars, and in the absence of proper
scientific studies it seems wise to replicate this environment as
closely as possible for healthy wine storage (see box).
Under
£1000
When
people start thinking about storing wine, their first thought is
usually to buy a wine cabinet. These come in a variety of shapes,
sizes and finishes and represent the simplest option for home
storage. They are more than just glorified refrigerators: in
addition to maintaining a steady optimal temperature, the
compressors are damped or housed separately to reduce vibration,
they keep high humidity, and the more expensive models may also have
heating units in case the ambient temperature drops too low.
If
you are considering going the cabinet route, some things to bear in
mind. Where are you going to keep it? If it’s in the garage or a
utility room then the finish isn’t crucial, but in a living area
you want it to look right and operate quietly. And what sort of
capacity do you want? 150 bottles might sound a lot to someone new
to wine, but it really doesn’t take long to accumulate double this
quantity. For
under £1000, options are fairly restricted. This sort of budget
will buy you a large unit from a cheaper manufacturer, or a smaller
capacity cabinet from one of the more upmarket producers.
Liebehrr
makes an extensive range of affordable wine cabinets. They have a
good reputation for quality, and the prices are attractive. The most
popular unit is the WKR 4176 which has a maximum capacity of 180
Bordeaux-sized bottles and which I’ve seen for sale as cheaply as
£659 on internet comparison shopping sites. Some might prefer a
stainless steel finish, which comes at a premium of £200+, as
opposed to the default Burgundy red. Refrigerator manufacturer Miele
make a similar cabinet for around the same price. While
they offer excellent value, there are two potential drawbacks with
the Liebherr and Miele units. First, because of their depth – the
same as a domestic fridge – the bottles can’t overlap neatly at
the neck. As a result the capacity is reduced compared with a
similar size purpose built wine cabinet. A second is that the
compressor is not designed for operation at an ambient temperatures
lower than 8 ºC, so these cabinets can’t be used in an unheated
garage or outbuilding. Also
in this price bracket are the Vintec cabinets (distributed by Vin
Garde), including smaller units specially designed to fit under
worktops in fitted kitchens. Although they’ve only just been
launched in the UK, Vin Garde’s Roy Wilson reports that demand is
very strong. Particularly elegant is a stainless steel fronted
model, priced at £899. They fit some 50 bottles and also offer dual
temperature zones. The Corner Fridge Company also sells a range of
under the counter units, including a fully integrated model. £1000–3000 For
this sort of budget we are still looking at cabinets, although the
choice expands quite a bit. Eurocave are probably the best-known
manufacturer, offering a wide, high quality range with a variety of
finish options. Because these units aren’t modified refrigerators,
their dimensions are such that bottles can overlap neatly at the
neck, which increases capacity. You can opt for smoked glass doors
for a more elegant look – this costs a little extra – or even go
for a stainless steel finish, which bumps up the price considerably.
Eurocave’s main competitor is Transtherm (available from Vin Garde),
whose cabinets offer similar quality and finish options for round
about the same price. Other
cabinets in this price bracket worth considering include models by
U-line and The Corner Fridge Company. It’s
worth bearing in mind that with wine cabinets there are different
combinations of shelving available, with a trade off between
capacity and convenience. The most efficient use of space involves
stacking bottles on top of each other in a way that makes it tricky
to access those at the bottom. Careful planning is required to avoid
awkward rummaging around to source that elusive bottle. One cabinet
owner I know reckons that the best way to arrange the storage space
is according to projected drinking windows. He arranges wines for
near term consumption on one shelf, those that need another year or
two on the second and so on. So if he has a number of bottles of a
wine he might put one on each of the shelves so he can follow its
progress as it matures. £3000+ If
space and budget permit, then you might want to think about
constructing your own cellar, using modified air conditioning units
designed to operate at lower temperatures. There are a number of
ways of doing this. If your DIY is up to it, you can build one
yourself. You’d need to partition off a suitable space with stud
walls, insulate it properly, add a vapour barrier and then put in a
suitable conditioning unit. There are a number of these on the
market, including the Fondis ‘Winemaster’ range (available from
Vin Garde and The Corner Fridge Company, from £1369) and a range
from Eurocave (from £1930). The classic reference work for this
sort of cellar construction is Richard Gold’s How
and why to build a wine cellar (ISBN: 0932 66454 7). If
this all seems a bit complicated, then there are companies that will
do the whole installation for you. The Corner Fridge Company is one
of these, and managing director Irwen Martin reckons that the key
appeal of this approach is that it’s a cost-effective way of
storing a lot of bottles. ‘If you are looking at wine storage the
first thought is to get a wine cabinet’, says Martin. ‘My
experience is that wine collecting is addictive, and whatever space
you think you will need, you’ll have to double it’. Martin
reckons that if, for example, you took off 1.5 m from the back wall
of your garage, this would make room for 1000 or more bottles for a
similar price per bottle as cabinet storage. For state of the art
cellar construction, a company called Apex design, manufacture and
install custom-built cellar racking. Although they normally supply
this for existing cellars, they can also build and install cellars
for customers. A
slightly different take on the walk on cellar is made by Vinosafe.
They offer kits for assembling walk-in cellars, and are distributed
by both Vinosafe and Vin-Garde in the UK. These modular cellars are
easy to assemble – ‘a 12 year old child could do it’ says
Vin-Garde’s Wilson – and keep good temperature and humidity
levels. They are 1.6 m wide and can be made to any length, holding
from 680 to 4000 bottles, and prices range from £5400 to just over
£13 000. An
ingenious option for wine storage is the spiral cellar. It’s a
solid concrete cylinder, sunk into the ground and with access
through a trapdoor. 2 m wide, the cellar comes in depths of 2, 2.25,
2.5 and 3 m depths, taking up to 1600 bottles. They are commonly
fitted in garages and conservatories. There are two big advantages
to this option. First, they don’t take up any living space.
Second, they are passive cellars, relying on the fact that the
temperature just below the ground in the UK hovers around 10 ºC and
with several tons of concrete surrounding the wines, fluctuations
are kept to a minimum. This means that there are no moving parts to
go wrong, nor any electricity bills. According to Spiral Cellar’s
Deryn Hemment, the most
popular installation is a 2m ´
2m cellar holding 1000 bottles for £7299. It takes 4 days to fit.
One
factor to consider if you’re thinking of constructing a walk-in or
spiral cellar is that you can’t take them with you when you move.
Therefore it’s worth considering whether they will add to the
value of your home, if you are likely to be selling in the short or
medium term. This will depend on the area and also the size of your
house. If you live in a suitably upmarket location then potential
buyers might consider a cellar to be an asset. But if you live in a
small suburban 1930s terrace and you’ve hived off part of the
kitchen area for wine storage, then you might put buyers off. Whatever
you decide to do, after last summer’s temperatures one thing is
clear. If you are buying decent wine, it’s a terrible gamble to
risk exposing your precious bottles to the vagaries of increasingly
unpredictable climatic conditions, and for storing top wines
temperature-controlled conditions are virtually a must. Around
Wine (Eurocave cabinets and conditioning units) 57
Chiltern Street,
London, W1U 6NDPhone: 020 7935 4679 Fax: 020
7935 0479 Wineware
(Wine racks and accessories, together with an extensive range of
fridges and cellar) Spiral
Cellars Ltd,
Court House, 23 Woodfield Lane, Ashtead, Surrey KT21 2BQ Liebherr, Express Way, Whitwood, Nr. Wakefield, West Yorkshire, WF10 5QJ The Corner Fridge Company, Unit 6, Harworth Enterprise Park, Brunnel
Industrial Estate, Harworth, South Yorkshire DN11 8SG Apex Higher
Dairy House, Allowenshay, Hinton St George, Somerset TA17 8TB U-line (wine cabinets) Miele
Company Ltd,
Fairacres, Marcham Road, Abingdon OX14 1TW Tanglewood
Wine Accessories (supply Liebherr wine cabinets and Coolmaster air conditioning units),
Tanglewood House, Mayfield Avenue, New Haw, Surrey KT15 3AG Norcool
Appliances Ltd,
Unit 8 London Road Business Park, Retford, Notts DN22 6BR Wechillit.com
(supplies Liebherr wine fridges at discounted prices), Unit 3a/3b,
Leighton Centre, Welshpool, Powys SY21 8HJ |
