See full version: Top Wedding Registry Questions Answered
A I like the way the height of stemmed glasses adds drama to a table setting drama and with stemware, there's a lot more options in terms of decorative cuts and colors. In order to be able to create a high/low landscape, register for some of both, stemmed goblets for wine and stemless glasses for water or soft drinks.
A If you know starting out that you won't be hosting lots of large fancy dinner parties, six place settings of formal china, which for the record has a gold or platinum band, is a good number to get you started. It'll give you enough plates to have four guests over for dinner--two of your best-friend couples or perhaps both sets of parents. For everyday dinnerware, six to eight place settings is a good number. As you'll be using these often, you'll have plenty of dishes to use while some are in the dishwasher. If your casual pattern will be your only set, you'll definitely want eight settings so you can also use them for guests. Many experts recommend registering for as many as twelve place settings but I find this overwhelms couples who wonder where they'll store it all in their starter apartments. If you only register for 6, it's also more likely you'll get everything you registered for instead of a mish mash of pieces. And more place settings make ideal anniversary gifts! [links]
A Stemless glasses are good as an all purpose option -- they work for wine, spirits, mixed drinks, and soft drinks. If you like to serve Champagne or sparkling wine, ask for flute-shaped glasses which make the bubbles last longer and keep the wine cool, as long as you hold the flute by the stem. Make sure flutes aren't so lightweight that they can easily tip over. If you want a good variety of glassware get flutes, wine glasses, highballs, DOFs (Double Old Fashioned), and beer glasses. Add martini, margarita, or coupes glasses if you serve cocktails. [links]
For help with other items, be sure to see my post on Expert Tips for a Wedding Registry. more
A Companies that have been around for a long time are responsible for classic patterns. While many designers have recently gotten into the dinnerware business, it's not as certain that their collections will be available when your family grows and you decide to add another six place settings. By choosing from brands with a long heritage, you have a better chance of being able to add to your collection or buy replacements in the future.
The first step is to elucidate how bubbles themselves come into being. Generally speaking, two methods exist, and sometimes coexist, to generate bubble chains in Champagne glasses. Natural effervescence depends on a random condition: the presence of tiny cellulose fibers deposited from the air or left over after wiping the glass with a towel, which cling to the glass due to electrostatic forces. These fibers are made of closely packed microfibrils, themselves consisting of long polymer chains composed mainly of glucose. Each fiber, about 100 micrometers long, develops an internal gas pocket as the glass is filled. Capillary action tries to pull the fluid inside the micro-channel of the fiber, but if the fiber is completely submerged before it can be filled, it will hold onto its trapped air. Such gas trapping is aided when the fibers are long and thin, and when the liquid has a low surface tension and high viscosity. Champagne has a surface tension about 30 percent less than that of water, and a viscosity about 50 percent higher.
High-speed photography can also capture the end of a bubble’s lifespan (see “The End of a Bubble” sidebar above). Most bubbles burst at the free surface during their migration from the center toward the edge of the vessel, whatever the glass shape. Only the top of the bubble emerges from the liquid, like an iceberg. As the fluid drains from the bubble top over about 10 to 100 microseconds, it reaches a thickness of less than 100 nanometers and ruptures. The inrushing sides of the collapsing bubble meet at the bottom of the cavity and cause it to eject a jet of liquid, which breaks up into droplets. The jet can travel at as much as a few meters per second and reach up to a few centimeters above the surface. A laser sheet in the symmetry plane of the glass highlights the projection of hundreds of Champagne droplets induced by such bursts. With a long enough exposure time, a digital still image gives one the feeling of visualizing a splendid droplet fog in motion above the Champagne surface.
The vortex-pair in the planar view of our image can be extrapolated to show a three-dimensional annular flow around the center line of bubbles. This means that a single fixed nuclear site on the glass surface can set the entire surrounding fluid into a small-scale ring vortex. But what really happens in normal Champagne-tasting conditions, with multiple nucleation sites? Is the entire volume of the Champagne affected? Are there different mixing flow patterns according to the method of effervescence? To answer these questions, we investigated two cases: one where only random nucleation sites are present and another where only controlled effervescence occurs. more
This may seem silly but my first thought was storage. I know that some glasses can be stacked etc but some just take up a lot of space. You will probably be getting lots of new kitchen items and space will run at a premium.
I would think about how often you gather and how many friends are typically at these gatherings. I have a tight-knit group of 7 girls that get together nearly weekly for drinks/dinner at each others houses - so if I were to have specialty glassware for say, martini night, I'd want at least 8, but if this group were 4 people, I'd only get 4 glasses.
I think 12 sounds a bit high if you and your FI do not host lots of parties with people who also like these drinks. If you both do host a lot of parties and see yourself needing 12 then go for it.
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Most people who enjoy champagne and other sparkling wines cite both its taste and effervescence as important factors. They therefore may want to invest in a champagne flute that is well manufactured, and not completely smooth on the inside. The narrow bowl at the top of a flute also helps to keep bubbles from escaping.
In banquet or catering settings, it may be fine to use less expensive champagne flutes, or even champagne saucers, which have a much wider bowl. Usually in such settings, champagne is consumed too quickly for it to lose much effervescence. Further saucers tend to be easier to sip from and to carry.
If you’re a fan of micro-brews or make your own beer, having a glass that produces nucleation may also be desirable. Some people prefer to drink finer beers out of champagne flutes. Again, holding the champagne flute at its stem will not affect beer temperature, and the special surface of the finer champagne glass will keep the beer nice and bubbly. more