Storing wine and beer

Marcia Bassett <marcia.bassett<-at->gmail<.>com> writes

>I would greatly appreciate any suggestions for long-term storage of
>Chinati Classico (2006 vintage from the Fattoria Nittardi vineyard )
>in bottles with artist designed labels and Beck's beer in bottles
>with artist designed labels. Do we empty the bottles?  If we decide
>to keep the wine/beer, what is the best storage container for the
>bottles?

If you decide to store the full bottles, then I would suggest
putting them into 6 mil polyethylene zip lock bags.

It is also common to use polyethylene buckets or jars to store
liquids in glass bottles. In this case the bottles would be
supported upright so that they didn't rattle around in the bucket.
The bucket should be not so large as to waste space, but not so
small as to overflow if there is a "containment failure".  However,
wine is best stored on its side so the cork doesn't dry out, so
maybe stick with the polyethylene bags for the wine. A bucket on its
side doesn't contain any spills.  One should also remember that
polyethylene does age. It slowly embrittles over the decades (the
speed depending on the purity and how it was processed), so remember
to check the containers every decade or so, and replace them if they
start to get brittle (says someone who got splattered with 20 year
old slime mould as a co-worker tried to move an old polyethylene
container of wet organic materials).

Valerie Tomlinson
Conservator
Auckland War Memorial Museum
Tamaki Paenga Hira
The Domain
Private Bag 92018
Victoria Street West
Auckland 1142, New Zealand
+64 9 306 7070 ext 7304


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 27:17
                 Distributed: Tuesday, October 15, 2013
                       Message Id: cdl-27-17-002
                                  ***