Deciding on where to store your wine is the main component of looking for wine storage. While our ancestors stored wine in deep dark caves or wine cellars, most people today aren’t able to store their wine in those kind of places. Wine hates light, heat, and motion, which is why the mantra for storing wine is cool, dark, still, and sideways. See the following reasons why people have stored wine a certain way for thousands of years:
Cool
Wine hates anything above 70 degrees Fahrenheit, and it could potentially ruin the wine if it reaches that temperature. 55 degree Fahrenheit is the ideal temperature for wine, but if that temperature varies one or two degrees that should be fine too. Humidity is also an important factor, because this keeps the cork from drying out and letting oxygen into the bottle, which will in turn oxidize the wine and make it undrinkable.
Dark Wine and sunlight do not mix, and there are a few reasons for that. Light particularly, UV light can prematurely age the wine. While white wines are more susceptible than reds, they can still fall victim in too much light. The light factor is one of the main reasons wine is stored in colored glass bottles, because it acts like sunglasses and it filters the UV sunlight out.
Still
Why does the bottle need to be kept still? Well there are a couple reasons, too much shaking can cause it to age prematurely and not in a good way. Also if it is a bottle of red sediment from the bottom can get distributed around that bottom, and then you are left with a gritty glass of wine.
Sideways
There are two major reasons to keep wine stored sideways and it has to do with the cork and having it be in contact with the wine to keep it from drying out and shrinking. Dry corks allow oxygen to get into the wine, and can damage it. The second reason is because storing it sideways allows you to save space and store more bottles in a smaller space.
Hopefully these wine storing methods will help you to buy the correct wine rack for your space. For more complex wine storing solutions it would be helpful to get a professional, and we highly recommend Wine Racks by Marcus, they have over 20 year of experience designing wine racks for their customers around the world! For more information click here.
Source: http://blog.vintagecellars.com/2014/11/how-to-decide-on-wine-storage/
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