Quick summary review of the Zalto wine glasses:
- Glasses range from $55 – 61 per glass, with no bulk discounts
- Zalto glasses are beautiful and noticeably different – even in photos people will comment on them and notice them
- They’re impossibly thin
- Wine simply tastes better in them (could be my imagination but isn’t much about wine sense and imagination?)
- They may or may not chip at the edge in your dishwasher
Ahh, I remember that the first time I tried a Zalto glass it was at Angler, a hip new seafood restaurant set on the Embarcadero waterfront in San Francisco, CA. Like it’s sister restaurant Saison, it’s inspired by smokey flavors, a robust wine list (basically a book) and an even more impressive bill at the end! Funnily one of the most memorable moments of both of these dinners involved incidents with wine. When my wine came out, I remember saying to my fiancé, “Damn, that’s a nice glass!” and we both stared at it in awe under the light. It’s a noticeably sexy, different glass. I hurriedly jotted down the brand and didn’t think about it again after looking up the price later – it simply wasn’t worth it at the time.
Fast forward to covid, we found ourselves spending a lot of quality time at home and drinking all the “good” wine. Because if a pandemic isn’t a special event what is?! Which leads me to…
Why I bought the Zalto Denk’Art Universal Wine Glasses
Before buying the Zalto glasses we had three daily drinkers in rotation in addition to the classic Riedel glasses (pictured left to right):
- Crate and Barrel’s Hip Large Red $6.95 – for his Napa reds. These are almost comically large but the menfolk love ’em
- Crate and Barrel’s Viv All Purpose Red Wine Glass $4.95 – for parties and everything else
- Schott Zweisel Tritan Glasses – 6 for $66.94 for my whites 🙂
While they are all lovely, beautiful and thin glasses with a delicate rim, they didn’t bring the OOMPH we were quite looking for. Also my favorite Peloton Facebook group (shoutout #pelowinos), who are completely my people and have fabulous taste, often touted the incredible feel of the glasses and I quite simply loved how they look so I decided to get just two, just for us.
First impressions of the Zalto glasses
We went with the Zalto Denk’Art Universal Glasses (vs. a varietal or red/white specific) since this way we could enjoy them across all of our wines. On first impression, the glasses were well packed in fancy packaging, which I appreciated and expect at this price point ($59.00 / glass).
While I didn’t have the courage to test if I could really squeeze them, as they do at the 8:20 mark in this video, the glasses feel impossibly thin in your hand. There’s also something about even just looking at them that make them utterly luxurious and great to elevate any date night. There’s something very obviously different about them when you see them in person.
Review of the Zalto glasses after a few uses
I’m happy to say that the novelty has yet to wane down for this beautiful glassware. We reach for them time and time again, and they’re our “default” glasses for date nights (aka basically all weekends since we don’t imbibe during the week).
The main thing that’s stopped me from purchasing more is the chip potential, which I go in to a bit more below.
How to wash and maintain Zalto glasses
This is my biggest beef with the Zalto glasses. Per the Wine Enthusiast’s website, “It is recommended that Zalto glasses be cleaned in a dishwasher. Hand-washing can add pressure and torque to the bowl, stem and base which can cause breakage and potential injury.” So for the first several months of ownership, I dutifully and happily cleaned the dishes in the dishwasher.
This was a big selling point for me – actively using a dishwasher has changed my life. I also love dishwashing glasses in particular because 1) They generally come out much clearer 2) Every. Single. Time. someone breaks a glass in my home and risks their artery being sliced open it’s because you’re trying to shove your big flexible hand in to that small (inflexible) glass.
But you guys, for me they chip. Both of them have chipped. When looking at the rim, you can see the glasses have the TINIEST of chips. In addition to being a real liability I’ve *never* experienced this with another wine glass. That being said I’m also truly the only person I’ve heard of this happening to…so I think the jury is still out there…
To solve for this instead of dish washing I now use my favorite wine glass soap which helps reduce spots (I was obsessed for awhile with how to get spotless glassware), VERY hot water, and hang them upside down. When the bowl has mostly dried but there’s a tiny bit of water collected at the rim, I then use a glass towel to avoid any discoloration at the rim from minerals in the water. This seems to have stopped the chipping issue and I haven’t seen any new offenders, since.
I still love these glasses, though and I hope to build out a larger set once I can confirm for a few months the chips were from being loaded in the dishwasher. I highly recommend them if you’re in to wine or foodie culture, especially because again the chips seem to be an uncommon issue and we are not known for loading our dishwasher gently 🙂
Zalto glasses- worth it, or worthless?
For me, I still love Zalto’s wine glasses. Teeny tiny chips, absurd price and all. It’s something I should probably ask customer service about in the future, but I still reach for these every (drinking) day and get bummed when I switch out my glass, so I think they spark joy and are worth it to me.
Definitely worth it.
Where to buy Zalto Denk’Art glasses
There are 2 ways you can purchase Zalto’s glasses, individually or in a “set”.
- 1 Zalto Denk’Art Universal Glass – $59.00 shipped
- 6 Zalto Denk’Art Universal Glasses – $359 shipped (so basically, no bulk discounts)
I use the word set loosely because..there’s no bulk/set discount so buy 1 or 10 if it makes you happy!
There are 2 places to buy Zalto glasses:
- Amazon $59.00 (free standard delivery for all, but not 2-day Prime)
- Wine Enthusiast $59.00 ($149 free ship minimum)
Universal glasses not your thing? No worries, Zalto also offers a variety of varietal specific-glasses, including glasses meant for beer and water, bordeauxs, burgundy wines, champagne and white wine at $55 – $61 a piece.
Let me know if you love your Zaltos as well, in the comments!