Give a decanter. Specifically, a
magnum-sized decanter.
Many wine collectors will buy magnums (or larger formats) for long-term cellaring as they tend to preserve the wine better than 750ml bottles due to a lower ratio of oxygen to wine in the bottle. While most wine collectors may have a couple of decanters, they aren't likely to have a magnum-sized decanter.
In fact, of the 15 decanters I own, only two are for magnums. There is something festive about large format bottles and that same is true for magnum decanters. If you have a great bottle of wine (which is very likely to
require decanting), why not present it in something beautiful? Britain's
William Yeoward is one of my favorite sources for decanters and I personally own two of the classic but modern
Geneviere design which comes in four sizes ranging from 400ml to 3200ml (sized for half bottles to double magnums).
Decanters may or may not have stoppers and many new designs avoid them for more flexibility in design. However, I generally prefer them
with stoppers so I can avoid drinking too much and safely "gas" what is left for consumption over the following few days.
An article in today's
Wall Street Journal called "
Old wine, new bottle" (WSJ online subscription required) discusses the decanter market's growth. It points out that Reidel's sales of decanters doubled from 2004 to 2005 (now accounting for 10% of its business) and that it has introduced six new styles in 2006. Even Williams Sonoma has almost doubled its decanter offerings in the past two years to 17 today.
My final suggestion is to buy early as magnum decanters are harder to come by and the design you prefer may not be easily located at the last minute.
