Collective Memory

There’s plenty of information out there about which wines to buy, where to buy them and how to store them. To learn more about the finer points of collector culture, I talked to some prominent local oenophiles

- Sarah Heller, MW

Wine collecting has a few fundamental advantages over other types of collecting: one, regular depletion, which frees up space for further collecting; and two, the act of depleting is rather enjoyable (and a boon to your popularity). The challenge for nascent wine collectors is that collecting solo isn’t much fun and collector circles can be tricky to penetrate.

Internationally, Asian wine collectors have gained notoriety for the decadence and sheer scale of their collections. Consequently, many were only willing to answer my questions anonymously. The scene is quite varied. Through wine associations like the Hong Kong Wine Society—one of Asia’s oldest, founded in 1981—the Ordre des Coteaux de Champagne, Confrérie des Chevaliers du Tastevin, and Knights of Alba, I’ve encountered collectors who could literally fi ll castles with bottles numbering in the hundreds of thousands and others whose collections are enviably succinct.