Know what you own

Most collectors are excellent buyers and reluctant managers.

We know what we love. We know what we paid. Very few of us know what our cellar is worth today, what condition it is genuinely in, which bottles are quietly passing their moment — or what would happen to any of it without us.

This evening is about the part of collecting nobody teaches.

Over two hours in the vault we will taste the same wine from two different storage histories, and you will understand in one mouthful why condition is the only loss that cannot be recovered. We will go through the four risks every private cellar carries — valuation, condition, provenance and time — and look at what can now be measured precisely rather than estimated.

Then, privately and to nobody but yourself, you will assess your own collection against eight questions. Most serious collectors cannot answer all eight.…