The Perfect Wine Cabinet (with no technical boundaries)

Hi all wine lovers!

I work as a product designer for a big wine cabinet brand here in Scandinavia. As a designer, I think it's the most important to understand user needs to optimize a good product to create the best wine- journey and experience. I also think it's important and also fun to co-create with users. That's why I'm writing in this forum, in hope to hear you as enthusiasts and experts what you are missing with today's wine fridges/cabinets and how you would like to optimize your wine experience. All from shopping the wine to serving/pairing.

I hope you don't find this inappropriate och going against any rules, but a way to start interesting conversations between us and you wine lovers in between.

My main question is:
If you ignore all the technical- and price constraints - how would your perfect wine cabinet be?
You can comment and discuss all from material- and color choices, a smart-wine appliance that could place music and adjust the light according to the wine you're drinking, an app to support bottle management, an appliance that would order wine for you, and usage of technologies like IoT, smart homes, connected appliances, AR, VR... you name it. Sky's the limit.

There's absolutely no right or wrong answers and no comments or ideas are stupid! I'm really looking forward to read your comments and discussions

Thank you so much in advance, I wish you guys a great summer.

[David M. Bueker]

Adjustable racking/slots are mandatory to deal with larger (e.g. Champagne) bottles. Also, since the cooling unit is the major failure mode it would need to have a relatively easy way to remove and replace the cooling unit with one of the same size, but also with adjustments that can be made to accommodate slightly different sizes since companies change dimensions all the time.

The rest is just details.

I have a cellar not a cabinet, but if I did my first priority would obviously be dependability. As David suggested adjustable (or at least varied) shelving to accommodate different bottle sizes.
As far as tech, remote notice of any temp variances is great.
I think for bottle management a key would be NOT a proprietary system, but simply a coordination with an existing program (which really should be Cellartracker, since it is by far the dominant progtam). If I could put my 1961 La Mission HB (a guy can dream) in slot K7 and then cabinet sent an alert (K7 is now empty) when I pulled would be very handy for keeping things up to date.

understand user needs .

All I would need is a reliable cabinet that would keep wine at a constant cellar temperature. That's it.

I don't need different temperature zones - if I need to chill a white I put it in the fridge - or at short notice - a chiller sleeve.

Playing music and adjusting lights is neither something I need or want. But I understand for you it would be a differentiator to competitor cabinets, but I wouldn't pay for it.

[Jenise]

I have a cellar now, but I did own a 500 bottle cooler from a popular manufacturer for a few years, and my #1 complaint would have been adjustable shelves as David describes. Most seem to be made for Bordeaux bottles, so burgundy and champagne bottles not only don't always fit, when they just-barely did the labels get scraped pulling them in and out.

As a fan Pinot Noir, I agree with David and Jenise. Bottles are wider. Adjustable = good.

Also, minimal footprint and windows/closures such that visibility of contents is simple. Easy to clean inside and out.

We have a 92-bottle cooler from Costco that had the desired footprint. Drawbacks are lack of adjustable racks and, because it's 10 rows in height, various body positions needed to view and count contents. That said, it was a big improvement over my prior, entry-level 50-bottle one.

Tradeoffs.