If you enjoy collecting good wines or making your own craft beer at home, you can quickly begin to run out of room to store your bottles. They can begin to take over the kitchen fridge or shelves in the pantry. What you need is a larger space in which to store beer or wine bottles where they’ll be safe until you’re ready to use them.
Could the garage be that space? A garage definitely has the additional room that you’d need to store wine or beer bottles, but is it safe to store them in there? Take a look at what you need to know about turning the garage into a beer or wine room.
What Makes Alcoholic Drinks Go Bad?
When determining whether or not you can safely keep beer or wine in your garage, you first have to think about what would make beer or wine go bad. Beer and wine need to be kept at a consistent temperature to stay good. Temperature fluctuations affect the chemical compositions inside the bottle, causing the taste to change. Ideally, both beer and wine should be stored at about 55 degrees Fahrenheit. Garages can become very hot or very cold depending on the weather, and the opening and closing of the large garage door can cause rapid fluctuations in temperature.
Another factor that affects beer and wine quality is the humidity of the room in which they’re stored. Wine in particular needs to be in a space that has at least 50 percent humidity to prevent the cork from drying out.
Finally, the presence or absence of light can also affect alcohol. Hops are particularly sensitive to light, and bottled beer should be kept away from light even if it’s stored in an opaque bottle.
These factors present challenges for beer and wine enthusiasts who are eyeing the garage as a potential storage space. It’s difficult to keep a garage at the correct temperature and humidity level on a consistent basis, and while most garages are naturally somewhat dark, too much light can also be a problem.
However, it’s still not impossible to store alcohol in your garage.
Installing a Wine Fridge
One of the simplest ways to store beer or wine in the garage is to simply install a wine fridge. These fridges are designed to keep wine in optimal conditions, including the correct temperature, humidity, and light level. Because beer keeps best under similar conditions, these fridges could be used for beer storage as well.
Building a Beer or Wine Enclosure
If you need more space than one fridge can provide, you might want to look into building an enclosure with the correct conditions inside your garage. You can build an enclosure with lumber, but you’ll need to make sure that it’s well-insulated to maintain a consistent temperature. With the addition of a small portable air conditioner and a humidifier, you can create a climate-controlled space within your garage that will keep your beer or wine safe and drinkable.
Adding a space to store beer and wine is one way to make your garage a more functional space that better meets your needs. For more great garage renovation ideas, schedule your free design consultation. 
