Iguana Wine Rack
I have this really great wine rack. It is hammered copper and has an iguana on the top. It was a gift from Beth ages ago; a prize she picked up on a trip to Nogales when she was still living in Arizona. I love it; everyone who sees it comments on it – I have had more offers to buy it than I can count, including one from the guy who came to estimate my move to Seattle, another from a woman I worked with who made me an offer sight unseen. It is just a really cool wine rack. It holds eight bottles of wine.
And there is my problem. I have waaaay more than eight bottles of wine. Not when it was given to me, of course. Then I was thrilled it if was even half full (and that in and of itself felt decadent!). But now, yeah, I need more room for my wine. So I have been out and about looking for wine racks the past few days, and I have noticed something interesting. Wine racks seem to come in kind of odd number combinations.
At Pier 1 I found a couple of pretty nice ones. One was a small table top rack that held ten bottles of wine. Another was a modular system with each row holding four. This piqued my interest and soon I was at Cost Plus where I found racks that ranged in number from three to ten. There was one six bottle rack and one 12 bottle rack, but most seemed to hold either four or eight. The pattern held at two other stores and when I searched on line.
Why is this odd to me? I guess because I now tend to buy wine in either half or full case quantities. It is probably a mixed case, but most wineries give a discount when you buy either of those numbers. In my world my assumption is that wine racks should hold a case wine; or at the very least, half a case. As I was whining about this with a friend last night the thought hit me – most of the country most likely does not buy wine that way. Most of the country does not live within easy driving distance of a thriving wine region, let alone several. Like I do. Most of the country buys a bottle or two at a time, maybe more for a special occasion. Because most folks out there are much more reasonable about the quantity of wine they need (not want, need) to have on hand.
I think back to when I first got that wine rack. I think about how I felt somewhat overwhelmed by the idea of owning eight bottles of wine. How I felt somewhat sophisticated and worldly the first time all eight slots were taken. I have to smile – check that, I have to laugh at myself. Because now? Now that rack is filled and I am looking for more storage, the reason I was looking at new wine racks. Because I have a couple of cases of wine on hand at any given time anymore, and I am whining because the wine racks don’t hold enough. At least not the pretty ones, or the cool ones; like mine.