Washing Bottles

I get so many comments about this bottle collection idea featured in the April issue of Body+Soul.  It was photographed at my house on the Delaware River and it's definitely one of my favorites: Just fill a square tray with a mix/match collection of vintage bottles and containers and fill them up with cuttings of wildflowers.

But lots of people have asked me, "how on Earth do you clean them?"    They seem to think I'm sitting here week in and week out dusting, polishing and scrubbing these bottles clean.   On the contrary: think dishwasher.

Just load the dishwasher with all the bottles and make sure they're spout side down; that way, water won't be collecting inside the bottles as they wash themselves clean.

The cutlery tray is perfect for smaller bottles.  They seem to fit snug inside and get really clean; no worry about small bottles slipping through and cracking.

20 minutes later, steamy cleaned bottles ready to be re-arranged on the tray.   How easy was that?

Comments

[alice]

Wonderful idea.

[Kerri K]

I LOVED this idea when I saw it in Body+Soul. I have actually been searching everywhere for bottles. It seems the only place I can find them is ebay but obviously, that is not ideal. I suppose when yard sale season picks up I may find more of them. I can remember as a kid, my mom and I were digging around in our garden and found like 8 really old medicine bottles. I wish she would have kept them. Anyone from the Philadelphia (specifically Roxborough/Manayunk) area who knows a good flea market? Danny, do you know of any in the surrounding area? The only real large flea market I know of is Q-mart in Quakertown.

[Jodi]

For real?! I am terrified to put anything vintage in my dishwasher.

[kristin]

brilliant :) I was just sitting here thinking "that is beautiful but OH the dusting!!" - I'm definitely going to be rethinking things like that now ;)
Thanks!

[Sonja]

I have been collecting glass bottles for over a year now. I use them a lot to put juice in for picnics or to carry with me in my little chest when I leave the house. I use cork to plug them up. I have an entire cabinet filled with them and never though of displaying them!

[tealchic]

what a great idea!

[Amy]

A great way to get out encrusted crud in bottles is to fizz it away with water and an Efferdent (or other fizzy denture cleaner) tablet. Or use a teeny-tiny amount of vinegar and a very small dot of baking soda for the same result -- think volcano-making in third-grade science class!

[jenny]

Pretty!

It reminds me a little bit of something my Grandmother did when I was little.

She had little bottles filled with colored liquid (I assume water w/food coloring, but don't know) sitting on the windowsills in her kitchen. When the sun shone through them the effect was wonderful.