Rooms with a cru

Successive lockdowns taught us to make the most of our homes, from the addition of everything from home offices to gyms. However, a wine room offers a much more sybaritic experience, finds Amelia Thorpe

- Amelia Thorpe

WINE rooms appear to be yet another of the enduring legacies of lockdown. Whereas we might have designed the occasional one in the past, now just about every project seems to include a wine room or wine display area, says interior designer Philippa Thorp. Nowadays, we want to have a little fun with our wine and show it off, rather than cellaring it away so that no one knows it is there. Although there are all sorts of ways of designing wine rooms to suit individual taste and size and value of collections, what they share, says Mrs Thorp, is a celebration of the magic of display. Make the wine worth looking at, just as you might a piece of art, she says. Choose beautiful materials, such as felt and velvet mixed with metal and wood, perhaps with an aged stone floor, and light it well.’

In a recent project, Thorp Design created a basement den, with areas for playing music, singing, playing poker and drinking wine late into the evening. Unlike traditional cellars, these are interactive spaces, designed to be enjoyed with friends, she says. In this room, frameless transparent glass doors offer excellent views of the bottles, stored in bespoke joinery, with a wine fridge to condition bottles ready for drinking. ‘Lighting accentuates the sense of theatre, a rustic brick floor introduces texture and different styles of shelving create interest,’ she notes.