Zwiesel Glas

Start with the wine you drink most often. For burgundy and pinot noir you want a wide, rounded bowl where the aroma can gather; Vervino goes up to 95.5 cl and Vuelo up to 84.8 cl, which sounds excessive until you realise you only fill a glass like that to a third. For bordeaux and full-bodied reds, the rounder bowl of Kolibri at 55.9 cl is plenty. White wine sits well between 31.9 cl for riesling and 51.7 cl for chardonnay, where the narrower bowl keeps the wine cool for longer.

If you would rather not choose by grape, look at Simplify. That series is organised by flavour profile instead of wine region, with a glass for light, fresh wines at 38.2 cl and a roomier one for fruity, delicate wines at 55.5 cl. For the rest of the table there are water glasses from 36.7 to 39.8 cl, an all-round glass of 64 cl with a fill line, and carafes from 50 to 100 cl. Behind the bar you reach for Destille No. 1 or the Bar Premium line.

Never fill a goblet more than one-third full. That feels counterintuitive with a 95 cl glass, but the space above the wine is why the bowl is so large: that is where the aroma collects, and you capture it by swirling the glass. If you fill it beyond the bowl's widest point, the shape works against you and you will smell virtually nothing.

Zwiesel Glas's thin rim does more than it seems. Because the wine enters your mouth over a sharp transition rather than a thick lip, it spreads differently and you taste the acidity more directly. Hold the glass by the stem, not the bowl, both to keep the wine cool and to avoid fingerprints on glass designed precisely for clarity. Behind the bar, the Destille glasses work perfectly for a stirred Negroni or a Dry Martini.

Tritan is a lead-free crystal glass with titanium and zirconium added to the mix. The result is a harder glass structure that copes better with the mechanical and chemical strain of a dishwasher: fewer scratches from basket wires, less of the dull haze left by aggressive detergent, and rims that are slower to chip. That is why glasses from this house are still clear after hundreds of wash cycles.

Dishwasher-safe does not mean unbreakable. The bowls are thinner than those of the hospitality line, so load them separately, keep the stems from touching, and choose a short programme up to sixty degrees. In a hard-water area, rinse afterwards with soft water, because limescale marks show up all the more on thin crystal. Polish with a lint-free cloth and hold the glass by the bowl while you do, not by the stem, because twisting is exactly when a stem snaps.

Are you looking for the more robust hospitality range from the same factory? Then Schott Zwiesel is the adjacent brand; these are two separate collections, so compare them side by side. If you prefer to choose by glass type rather than brand, start with the wine glasses or go straight to the red wine glasses and the champagne flute glasses. Decanters from series such as Air Sense and Pollux can be found among the wine decanters. If there is wine left in the bottle, the wine stoppers keep it tasting good for one extra day.