Your wine collection is growing, and you've finally decided to take the plunge and purchase a wine cooler. These free-standing units, also called wine refrigerators, come in many shapes and sizes, not to mention price levels. As you browse websites and look through catalogs, you begin to realize just how many wine coolers are out there. How will you ever choose?

Profile of Riedel Glas Austria One of the most influential companies in the world of wine has never produced wine at all. In fact, Riedel Glas Austria got its start several centuries ago, refining glassware and making window panes. Today, Riedel is widely considered to have forever changed the way the world tastes wine.

At some point in your wine collecting "career," you will probably begin to dream of owning a true wine cellar, a walk-in area of your home where your entire collection rests on matching racks, waiting for you to step inside and choose a bottle. Inspired by the gorgeous photographs of celebrity wine cellars, you might wonder if you should talk with a wine cellar expert about designing a cellar in your own home.

Once you have started collecting wine, you need to find a place to store all those bottles. For some collectors, a wine cooler or wine refrigerator is a good solution. For many wine enthusiasts, however, the collection quickly outgrows the wine cooler unit. Purchasing wine racks and creating a wine cellar or wine storage area is the logical next step.

There comes a point in almost every wine lover's life at which wine enjoyment turns into wine collecting. It might happen when you're at a wine festival or winery tour and discover a wine so wonderful that you take the plunge and bring home a case. Or, perhaps a friend who is moving out of town brings you several bottles of wine, saying, "I can't take these with me, so I want you to enjoy them." Either way, your collecting days have begun.

Picture this: you've just made your first foray into the wonderful world of wine buying. You remember reading somewhere that too much heat is really bad for wine, so you unload your car as quickly as possible. As you set the last case down, you realize that you haven't decided exactly where you will put all of the bottles. Now that the wine is actually in your home, it's time to make some wine storage choices.

While getting ready for a recent holiday celebration, I discovered that I had far fewer wine glasses in my cabinet than I had thought (I am known for my klutzy tendencies). With several wine enthusiasts coming to my home for dinner, I needed to start shopping for replacement glasses. What I found was a bewildering array of shapes, sizes and prices, not to mention colors and patterns. Shopping for stemware can definitely be overwhelming.

I cannot begin to count how many times I have been asked to build a wine cellar for a client that either had little or no vapor barrier or it was done wrong. Most of the time the client,builder, or GC had no idea what a vapor barrier is. I will try to explain the importance of proper insulation,vapor barrier, and of course humidity.

It's very easy to get caught up in the design (look) of your wine cellar, (Tuscan, contemporary, etc) but some people overlook the finer details of the overall space. Planning for capacity -not just how many bottles you currently own but how many will you have over the next 5, 10, 15 years- allows you to "grow" into your wine cellar.

What’s in a wine fridge? Well, wine, naturally. But how does one make a decision on whether to buy a standalone cooler or shell out big bucks on a tricked-out, built-in wine storage system? There are a lot of things to consider about size, scale and quality – not to mention price – when it comes to properly storing your precious vino. Here is some great information to guide your decision.