Midwest’s Largest Wine Bottle Produced in Iowa
Fireside Winery, in rural Iowa County, Iowa, has a new attraction. On Thursday, June 13th, Iowa’s largest wine bottle was unveiled on the front lawn of Fireside Winery. The metal wine bottle, measuring13′ 7″ and weighing 1820 pounds was constructed by local metal artist, Randy Schnebbe. Randy and his wife, AJ, are the owners of RS Welding Studio in Victor, Iowa which specializes in handcrafted, metal yard creations.
Fireside Winery displays and sells RS Welding’s wine and garden art creations in their tasting room. The idea for the wine bottle started 2 years ago, after Fireside received so many positive comments from Randy’s 291 wine bottle Christmas tree that he let them showcase in front of the winery during the holidays. ‘It was fun to see how many people where snapping photos of it and that got us thinking, we should have a larger than life wine bottle for them to take pictures with too,” said Fireside Winery owner, Rona Wyant.
Mr. Schnebbe was up for the challenge and got started with the project last year when he located a used Anhydrous Ammonia tank for the base of the bottle. With the help of his cousin, Peter Miller (Vancouver, WA), they spent nearly 40 hours on the project which included sandblasting the exterior, removing the interior plumbing, adding the bottle neck and stabilizing feet, and fabricating the Fireside Winery label. It took two material handling vehicles and 5 men to move the monstrous wine bottle from the transport to its new home located adjacent to Fireside Winery’s driveway on Thursday.
Cassie Bott, Randy Schnebbe and Peter Miller of Fireside Winery next to the Midwest’s biggest wine bottle.
Fireside Winery owners, Bill and Rona Wyant also farm corn and soybeans near Marengo, Iowa so it’s fitting the new wine bottle shares a history of agriculture and is now part of their newer venture in the wine business. Both Fireside and RS Welding are excited to share the new wine bottle with the public and hope it has a positive impact to both businesses. To build excitement for the new creation, both businesses plan on running a Facebook Contest for fans to guess how many bottles of wine would actually fit inside the metal bottle. Become a fan of Fireside Winery and RS Welding Studio on Facebook and watch for more details as they become available.
See related story: Fireside Winery Engages Volunteers
