Building a Home Wine Cellar [3 Things to Consider]

Little in life spreads cheer as well as a delicious libation shared among family and friends, and as any host or hostess knows, presentation is half the experience. Here’s how you can easily incorporate a wine cellar into your Atlanta house renovation.

Let’s start with the practical elements--how much does it typically cost to install a wine cellar in your home? According to Home Advisor, the national average is $40,000, with $500 representing low-end additions and $100,000 representing high-end additions. Why is that range so large? This will become apparent as we examine your options for location and set-up.

Selecting a Location

The first decision you’ll need to make is where to set up your wine cellar. Will you locate it in your formal dining room to have wines easily accessible during dinner? Will you build a wine cellar into a nook of your kitchen to enhance its classiness? Will you convert an unused closet space? Will you build a basement cellar with an adjacent entertaining bar? No matter which location you choose, you’ll want to be sure that your wines won’t be exposed to sunlight, which damages their integrity. Additionally, the space you choose should match your primary purpose, be that oriented simply toward storage or also toward display.

Controlling Humidity and Temperature

Next, it’s time to address the basics of your wine cellar design. For this, we need to think about controlling for the appropriate humidity and temperature. Humidity should be kept within a range of 50-70%, and temperature should be kept within 50-59 degrees F to help control aging. Of course, to keep your in-home wine cellar within this range, you’ll need to ensure your space is properly insulated and that all areas of the cellar, including your door, are airtight. (You’ll also want to make sure that whichever display lights you select won’t produce too much heat.)

Wine Cooler Direct presents several wine cooling units that can control your cellar’s environment. These include self-contained units, split system units, and ducted system units. You can read more about each type of system, as well as preferred system brands, by referencing this article.  

Display Options

Now we get to the fun part--how will you display your wine? As we mentioned before, presentation counts when it comes to entertaining guests, so you’ll want to assess each display option carefully. Various display options include stackable wine racks, wall-mounted wine racks, diamond bin wine racks, case storage wine racks, and, of course, custom-built individual storage wine racks like the one we built in this Midtown Atlanta home.

No matter which style captivates your sommelier heart’s fancy, we look forward to helping you add a touch of elegance and fun to your Atlanta home during your upcoming house renovation.