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On vacation, you need the right wines and a good cellar to lay them in
By Matthew DeBord
Photograph by Jeff Harris
(click image to enlarge)
If you own a second home, it only makes sense to own a second wine cellar. In fact, according to Nidal Daher, of Unique Wine Cellars and Sommelier Connection, it’s a wise investment: “Eighty to 90 percent of the people who might one day be interested in buying that second home from you are probably going to be into wine.”
Renowned for his expertise as a sommelier, Daher has been in the cellar-design business since 1995. He creates ten to 20 cellars per year and has worked with a variety of clients, including Detroit-area sports superstars and affluent Midwesterners with second homes around the country and in Mexico. A veteran of the restaurant business, he also provides wine-consulting services, advising on how to maintain, monitor, and grow collections. This can involve everything from telling clients when to sell wines at auction to, in the case of one enthusiast, helping to acquire a $1 million collection in a single shot. A typical commission for Daher involves customiz-ing a wine-storage cabinet—complete with temperature and humidity controls, and space for 500 to 1,000 bottles—to fit with a client’s decor. Major cellars, designed to hold thousands of bottles, can cost upwards of $200,000, but the smaller “satellite” versions range between $4,000 and $10,000.
When asked what his clients typically stock in their second-home cellars, Daher says it’s simply a slimmed-down version of what they store at home. “They keep the wines they normally drink,” he says. As for what to lay down, as they say in the wine business, he proposes a simple strategy: “It’s like the stock market—you have to diversify.” unique-winecellars.com
> A cellar should represent the world’s great collecting regions. Daher recommends: in Bordeaux, CHÂTEAU LAFITE ROTHSCHILD 1995 ($600); in Burgundy, DOMAINE LEROY CLOS DE VOUGEOT 2003 ($700); among Super Tuscans, CASTELLO DI AMA L’APPARITA 2004 ($240); for California cabs, one of the “cult” wines, such as SCREAMING EAGLE 2005 ($3,000) can be superb; and when it comes to Spain, VEGA SICILIA UNICO 1998 ($450).
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