What the Oldest Continuously Used Wine Cellars in the World Have in Common
The oldest continuously used wine cellars in the world are found in the Château Rieussec winery in Bordeaux, France. Each of these wine cellars shares certain commonalities that have allowed them to survive for so many centuries.
The wine cellars that have been in use for centuries are the Champagne caves carved into the chalk bedrock, the ancient monastery cellars of Burgundy, and the Port cellars that date back to the seventeenth century. These wine cellars have survived the ages due to their functionality and efficiency in storing wine for extended periods. The reasons for their success in the past remain the same today, and understanding these aspects of wine cellar history can help to increase knowledge about the craft of winemaking. For Cellar Cooling Cheltenham, visit https://www.acecc.co.uk/cellar-cooling/cheltenham
Beyond their shared history, one of the other things that both the French and Spanish wine cellar traditions have in common is geological. The best historic wine cellars were built into rocks – such as chalk, limestone, granite or tuff – rather than constructed above them. The properties of rock allow the temperature within the cellar to remain relatively stable over time, even during changes in the outside weather.
Beyond sharing the same type of construction, these two buildings also share a second characteristic in common – their depth. The deeper into the ground that these two buildings were constructed, the less likely they were to be exposed to the variations in temperature, lighting, and humidity that exist at the surface of the Earth. So, these buildings were constructed at depths that would protect them from such variations, ensuring that they could stand the test of time.
The modern approach to cellar cooling attempts to replicate the geological process that occurred naturally within the caves that existed in Europe during the Middle Ages.
