Enophile's Challenge - Cherry Wood Wine Bottle Puzzle

The Enophile's Challenge is a wine bottle you take apart and then have to put back together. Eight cherry pieces: six grape clusters, a wine glass, and a cork, which fit inside the bottle-shaped frame one way and one way only. It works as a brain teaser and as something you leave out on a bar shelf or a kitchen wall, which is the point of a puzzle shaped like decor. We make it in our family workshop in Hudson, Florida.

It is a packing puzzle, so the difficulty is not in finding the pieces but in fitting them. The clusters have to nest against each other in the right order before the glass and the cork will drop in. At 13 by 4.5 by half an inch it reads as an object from across a room and still hands across a table comfortably. A printed instruction and solution sheet comes in the box, so nobody is stuck for good.

We cut it from cherry rather than a paler wood because this one is meant to be left out where people see it, and cherry holds its colour against a kitchen wall. The same puzzle is made in maple on a separate listing if you want the lighter version.

The cork can be laser engraved with a name, a date, or a short line, which is what turns it into a retirement, anniversary, or thank-you gift rather than a generic one. For engraving and custom work, write to us at [email protected]. Standard orders leave our Florida shop within one business day and engraved orders take two.

For the lighter wood, see the Bottle of Fine Wine in maple, or browse our Food and Drink puzzles.