Disclaimer: I was sent this Swan brand retro cooler/wine fridge to review free of charge, but words and pictures are mine. This post contains affiliate links, see more information here. For 20% off all Swan Brand products, use the discount code whinge20 here.
I won’t lie to you, since lockdown started my consumption of wine has shot straight up. That’s why I was delighted to receive a Swan retro table top cooler (aka my sexy new wine fridge) in exchange for a post on Instagram, but I thought I’d share it here too because frankly I love it.
It technically stores 12 bottles of wine although if you’re inventive, you can get a few more in slotted between. Currently ours is holding 15 bottles of wine, three cans and a couple of kids’ smoothies.
Not that you really need to chill that much wine in one go unless you’re planning on a big party (and right now, that’s a bad idea!), but if you happen to belong to a wine club and order your wine in bulk like we do, then it’s a great and stylish place to store the bottles.
And of course you can always use it for other drinks… and even food. Mind blown.
Dimensions and important information
The counter top cooler is bigger than you might expect with a 46l capacity. It is almost 50cm tall, 43cm wide and has a depth of 50cm. Make sure that you measure the space you are intending it to fit it. Luckily we have quite a bare kitchen so it fit right in the corner.
If this isn’t quite what you had in mind, Swan have a whole range of retro fridges and freezers, including 115l under counter coolers, and large fridge freezers. You can get 20% off the entire range of Swan Brand products using the code whinge20.
It’s an A+ rated appliance.
Set up of the Swan Retro Cooler
Put the fridge in the place where it will be positioned, plug it in and then switch it on, turning the dial on the back to 3 or 4 (once it was down to temperature we moved the dial to 3 and found this was adequate). Leave it to sit for several hours before putting anything inside it to chill.
It will be quite noisy as it’s getting down to temperature but once it has got there, it switches on intermittently and although it’s not the most quiet appliance we have in the kitchen, it really doesn’t bother me at all.
The door can be moved to open whichever side you prefer and this is really easy (I did it myself!) and just requires a screwdriver and five minutes. The fridge comes supplied with an extra Swan decal set (it peels off very easily) if you want to re-apply it after you’ve moved the door.
What is inside the Swan retro table top cooler?
Inside you get a wine rack shelf, a shelf and a lower wine rack.
The shelves and wine rack of the Swan Brand retro cooler all come out so you can place them however you like within the mini wine fridge, but as it comes there is a deep wine rack for four bottles at the top, a shallow shelf which can be positioned at or below the cooling section, and a wine rack which holds four bottles and sits on the bottom across the width.
It was a bit of a pain when we discovered we’d ordered bottles with corks as they obviously can’t lie flat like a screw top bottle once open, but needs must; if you remove the lower wine rack and the shelf, you can stand full bottles upright.
Anything else?
It has a light inside which is on all the time; this casts a nice white light over the kitchen at night. I really like it, but if you don’t you can turn it off via the switch below the thermostat.
It’s made from plastic which does pick up fingerprints so will need to be wiped down to keep it looking good. It’s available in various different colours although some are currently out of stock.
How much and where to buy
It’s available on the Swan website here and is currently on sale for £115. There is a whole range of matching retro homeware too.