Some simple guidance on how to look after and store your wine so that when you're ready to pop, it's ready to sing

Wine is alive to its environment. It reacts to temperature and light in a way that an industrial product like Coca-Cola doesn't. If you treat it with a wee bit of care and respect it will repay it many times over in pleasure. As Paul said, in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make.

If drinking straight off the bat, store your bottle upright, away from extremes of heat (like an open fire), light (in direct, sustained sunlight on the window sill or the close to the surface to the sun), or sudden jarring movements (thankfully it’s difficult to mistake it for a rugby ball or tackle machine).

If you’re going to open it in the next month or so, store it somewhere cool, away from direct light or sunlight, and also vibration. A quiet, tucked away shelf or corner somewhere should suffice.

If you’re planning on keeping for a special occasion a few months away, store it horizontally on a rack – or securely on a shelf. This keeps the cork wet – most bottles are still stopped by cork – and correspondingly avoids it drying out and potentially spoiling with exposure to the air.

If you’re settling down and getting serious about wine – the equivalent of picking out curtains on a Saturday afternoon – a purpose designed, sturdy rack or wine refridgerator are worth considering. The latter – unless purchasing one of those little beer fridges beloved of Neil and Martin in Men Behaving Badly – get seriously expensive quickly but if the bottles you’re storing are valuable, there’s sense in investing in custom produced storage. 

Wine fridges are designed to maintain the ideal temperature (9-14 °C) and humidity atmospherically and orient the bottle to ensure the wine and cork remain in contact and preserved. We use Eurocave – which is the fancier end – but there are several credible options to consider.

Some guidance for storing wine, whether preserving a valuable wine collection, or keeping your everyday wines in a good condition ready to pour and delight.