When you are passionate about wine you begin collecting it … and when you begin collecting it you need a place to store it.
A closet can easily be turned into a mini wine cellar to store your growing wine collection.
Before you begin converting your closet into a wine cellar consider the position of the closet relative to the rest of the house.
Avoid converting a closet against an outside wall into a wine cellar. The outer walls of your house or apartment can frequently be subject to wide fluctuations in temperature. Ideally, choose an internal closet where your wine will be able to be stored at a more constant temperature.
The degree and the speed of any change in temperature are critical elements in successfully storing and aging wine. A gradual change of a few degrees between summer and winter shouldn’t be a cause for concern. A similar change each day will harm your wines by ageing them too rapidly.
A major rule when storing wine is to avoid large (or quick) temperature changes. You’ll notice damage of this type immediately from the stickiness that will often form around the capsule. Over time the continual expansion and contraction of the wine will damage the integrity of the cork. It’s just like having the cork removed and replaced every day. When this occurs, tiny quantities of wine can be pushed out along the edge of the cork (between the cork and the bottle neck) allowing air to seep back in. Once air comes in contact with your wine the irreversible process of oxidation will begin and your wine will be ruined.
At 55º to 58ºF the wine will age gracefully, enabling it to fully develop as the winemaker intended. Higher temperatures will age wine more rapidly and cooler temperatures will slow the ageing process. Your wine will be irreversibly damaged if it is stored at a temperature above 82ºF for as little as a month.
The most difficult part of creating a wine cellar in a closet can be finding other places to store the original contents of the closet! You should be ruthless … remove all the present contents (give away / auction / move them) and start with an empty closet!
Buy inexpensive wine racks from a hardware store, online retailer or storage shop and you’ll have an easy and very effective mini wine cellar.
Wine rack designs vary in bottle density; price variations have more to do with appearance than efficiency.
Individual racking makes it easy to select bottles. If you place racks against only one wall of the closet you may still have floor or shelf space available for wines that you purchase by the case.