The Queen's cellar

Anything to do with Port.
Post Reply
User avatar
Axel P
Taylor Quinta de Vargellas 1987
Posts: 2027
Joined: 08:09 Wed 12 Sep 2007
Location: Langenfeld, near Cologne, Germany
Contact:

The Queen's cellar

Post by Axel P »

dolls-house-1-700x5118.jpg
dolls-house-1-700x5118.jpg (83.67 KiB) Viewed 4779 times
I guess all UK based readers already know about the curiosity of the dollhouse in Windsor castle, which was manufactured for Queen Mary 1924.

What you might not know is that the Berry Brothers supplied the wine-cellar for the dollhouse. There are some 1.200 bottles with orginal labels and ORIGINAL wine inside these bottles. I guess life must have been quite boring at the time.

Portwise there are:

2 dozen – Cockburn Smithes & Co. 1878

2 dozen – Taylor Fladgate 1896

2 dozen – Warre 1900

2 dozen – Fonseca 1908

2 dozen – Dow 1912 (magnums - whatever you call a magnum in a dollhouse)

2 dozen – Royal Tawny

I am not sure about the ageing conditions due to the bottle size...

The full article can be read here: https://blog.bbr.com/2016/06/01/smalles ... ver-dealt/

Axel
queens-dolls-houses-crates-700x480.jpg
queens-dolls-houses-crates-700x480.jpg (78.93 KiB) Viewed 4779 times
Last edited by Axel P on 16:28 Mon 15 Feb 2021, edited 1 time in total.
worldofport.com
o-port-unidade.com
Andy Velebil
Quinta do Vesuvio 1994
Posts: 3028
Joined: 22:16 Mon 25 Jun 2007
Location: Los Angeles, Ca USA
Contact:

Re: The Queen's cellar

Post by Andy Velebil »

Cool story and 1851 Cockburn’s as well!
User avatar
JacobH
Quinta do Vesuvio 1994
Posts: 3300
Joined: 16:37 Sat 03 May 2008
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Re: The Queen's cellar

Post by JacobH »

The dolls’ house is absolutely spectacular. They tried to reproduce all sorts of things from the period so there are barrels of Scotch, books in the library which were written by famous authors, genuine works of art etc. etc. Well worth looking at if you have a chance!
Image
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: The Queen's cellar

Post by jdaw1 »

Also discussed in a different BBR blog post: Mystery in miniature.
User avatar
Alex Bridgeman
Graham’s 1948
Posts: 14880
Joined: 13:41 Mon 25 Jun 2007
Location: Berkshire, UK

Re: The Queen's cellar

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

They have some of the surplus bottles still in a showcase in the shop in St James.
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
User avatar
JacobH
Quinta do Vesuvio 1994
Posts: 3300
Joined: 16:37 Sat 03 May 2008
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Re: The Queen's cellar

Post by JacobH »

Two dozen of these miniature bottles + some spares seems to me to less than a glass of liquid from the original bottles. I hope they had a good party with the leftovers once the filling process was complete!

(PS. Can you imagine them doing this today: they’ve had to make a miniature T-Cork, a miniature Coravin etc. etc.!)
Image
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: The Queen's cellar

Post by jdaw1 »

The Dolls House was one-twelfth size, suggesting bottles hold 757 ÷ 12³ ≈ 0.44ml, or about one 114th of our standard fourteen-person measure.

That assumes that the glass is one-twelfth thickness. If a bit thicker than that, as is plausible, then the bottles would hold even less.
Post Reply