Some of my collection of champagne capsules.

Confession time: I am a placomusophile. Sounds vaguely illegal, doesn’t it? It comes from the French world ‘placomusophilie’, which means the act of collecting the metal capsules (known as a ‘plaque de muselet’) that sit atop the corks in bottles of champagne and other sparkling wines. Hence the photo! The familiar system of wire muzzle and metal capsule used to keep corks in place in bottles of these potentially explosive wines was invented by Adolphe Jacqueson in 1844.

World Champagne Day is 20 October, so if…