I have this wine closet which has 3 rows of bottles and is 19 inches deep, so 15 would be plenty, provided you have some place to vent the cooling/fridge unit into. My cooling unit is mounted behind the finished back interior wall into a utility room.
Thanks @James_Mc ! Yep, @Miguel_L i THINK 15 should work…but youll probably need every bit of that when you factor in the glass doors pivoting when they open. If you have the 3-deep vintage view racks bolted to the wall, you’re looking at around 13 inches (rough math looking at mine which is 4 deep - 3 in front and 1 in the back and attached to columns in the center of the wall). So probably doable…but maybe kinda tight.
For cooling we have a split system built into the center/ceiling, which works great and is super quiet. Not sure what other options you would have here
Nice cellars!!
Thank you very much @James_Mc , @Ian_H and @Rich_Brown !!
I think it can be done, a little tight but doable. I should have multiple glass doors to access the wines.
I’ll let you know if I’ll do it. I’ll call for some estimates.
Good luck! I hope it works out for you ![]()
This is the first winter since putting my cellar in service, and I am still learning its seasonal cycle. Through the summer and fall, it did great: 55°F and 70% humidity. However, starting in November, the humidity has been slowly dropping. When it finally dipped below 50% this week, I decided to do something about it.
My first attempt was lifted straight out of Gold’s book: a bucket of water with a wet rag hanging over the edge (to wick up more water). After two days, I didn’t see any change in the humidity. It’s quite possible (probable) that I didn’t wait long enough, but I’m an impatient fellow.
So for my second attempt, I repeated the process, except I used hot water. (Actually straight from the kettle.)
Bingo! Attempt #2 worked great. There was an immediate spike in humidity before humidity dropped and leveled of at a new higher baseline. (See the leftmost arrow in the graph below.) The walls, ceiling, and bins in my cellar are all wood, and my best guess is that the drop in humidity after the spike is from all that wood absorbing water as everything returns to humidity equilibrium.
The next day, after the humidity leveled off, I refreshed the hot water and saw the same pattern: Humidity initially spiked before settling into a new higher baseline.(See the rightmost arrow in the graph below.)
The fact that this is a problem at all probably means that I need to take a look at the weatherstripping on my cellar door, but I thought I’d share this tip with the group in case anyone else faces the same issue.
Edit: If you use this method, but sure to put a high sided drip pan under the bucket. The rag will drip water. I just put a plate under the bucket, and it overflowed.
Very helpful. I have the same problem, with low humidity, but am not really enthusiastic about having to carry water in and out of the cellar for the rest of my life. I have a whisperkool 4000 and hoping the whisperkool tech support can help me adjust the humidity. We will see!
I wouldn’t worry about humidity of 50%.
-Al
Are you using an air temp probe or bottle probe?
I have a CellarCool (same product, just procured through HVAC company vs retail) and it took me a while to figure out the humidity using a bottle probe. My run times are about 1.5h on then 5h off, so the coils collect a lot of moisture during the 1.5hr runtime. I just had to set the fan to run for a while at the end after temp is reached and it does a much better job of maintaining humidity.
Although our cellar setups are probably different ( I cool through a Mini-Split w/ Coolbot) I am in TX and sometimes struggle with humidity in the winter months. My solution to this was to add a humidifier, it is a smart humidifier and I have it programmed to come on when the humidity drops below a certain threshold. Usually only take a few minutes for it to get the humidity back up and it shuts off. Hope this helps
https://www.dreo.com/products/hm311s-smart-humidfier-white?_gl=1*v64xry*_up*MQ…_gsMQ…&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIv4vV9pvLiwMVKG5_AB15yhoIEAAYASAAEgIVGvD_BwE
Looks great, but what about light and heat from fire??
That’s an idea. I don’t know. I have to call a company (ies) to give me an estimate and tell me what else needs to be done. Just I didn’t want to call them if it wasn’t possible to do it with 15” deep.
I have a 300 and 2 of 50 bottle wine coolers that are in full capacity and wines all over the garage (with AC) . I was thinking to buy another 300 wine cooler. But again, space is a problem.
Hope it not that expensive and I can make it.
Update:
I went with Etsy brass stamped plates for the wine racks. I did experiment with stamping my own plates, which is a much cheaper route, but it became clear I did not have the talent+experience+patience for that. The shop I used is called “aVintageParcel”, they are amazing, look them up. (Ask for 3/8" font on a 1" tall plate.)
I purchased plates for the wine category and the rack numbers separately, 2x1 and 1x1, although you can also put them both on a single 3x1 plate. I used small brass “escutcheon” nails to hang the plates, with Museum Wax to keep them stable. I did not go to extreme lengths to line everything up perfectly, keeping with the hand-made feel. (Yes, that’s an excuse for not paying $80k for a custom cellar built by pros, but you gotta roll with it!)
For the 7" earthquake silicone bands, I decided to limit the colors to roughly desert tones to fit the theme. This represents a wastage of about 6 bands per 10-band rainbow package on Amazon, but it is what it is. Using brass chains is also a possibility – there is another Etsy shop called “CleverDelights” that will sell you “6x8mm Antique Bronze Curb Chain” in bulk, from which you can make 14" circumference chains. Again, though, very time-consuming to make those, plus there is the danger of capsule or label damage from the metal. But I’d be lying if I didn’t think it would look better than silicone bands.
Total capacity about 1700 bottles. Obviously not close to filled-up yet, but I fear it will happen. Still keeping my WineBank locker for super high-value bottles and emergencies. (Translation – skip the home invasion if you’re looking for cases of Richebourg or Lafite.) I can’t recommend WineBank highly enough for offsite storage in the SF Bay Area.
Nice pictures, thanks!
You will, I fear, find that space fills up fast once you have nice storage. Uptown problems tho ![]()
Curious though, why a person needs “BURG” nameplates?
Is there another kind of wine?
Kidding, though not by much-our cellar is mostly Burgs and Champagne
Sorry, bumping an old post but I am about to pull the trigger on these Rosehill Rack and looking at the manual, it doesn’t sound like these are secure to the studs? Just secured to drywall with plastic anchors and 1 1/4" screws? I imagine there are no issues with stability?
Not Dave, but I also have rosehill modular racking. Current cellar doesn’t have drywall, but re-used some 3/4 pine shiplap paneling in the space- which is secured to stud. BUT, previous house had the same racks and was into drywall, with anchors as needed. The racks, when assembled properly are pretty stable on their own, free-standing with the force of the load going into the floor. The anchors and other securing protocols were more than adequate to keep everything stable and prevent any tipping. I did try to line up some of the anchors to go into Stud though, to be safe.
Am Dave and I took the approach Scott mentioned at the end. Rather than put the brackets at the corners of the bins and use the anchors, I put the brackets wherever they lined up with the studs and screwed into the studs.
Thanks. Sounds like I will be ok either way, but I rather be safe than sorry. I think I am going to try and line up the brackets with studs if possible or maybe just screw a stringer into the studs and attach the rack to the stringer.
Do any of you know of a website that allows for designing a home cellar?
I ask because I am considering one for my home, and would love to be able to plug in the room measurements, then add in various types of racking etc and play around with layout, etc.
Thanks in advance…
Have you searched for any? I would start with the sites that cell racking. They may have some free software.
Not the most pretty solution but I did figure something out today; there are some wire racked shelves (I believe they’re 14” depth) that perfectly fit 5 magnums per shelf. If you can get more shelves you can easily store 50 magnums in each of those shelves.







