Barry Flink, a True Collector
The liquor and liqueur bottles represent rich religious and cultural traditions.
Atlantan Barry Flink maintains a growing collection of chess sets, miniature liquor and liqueur bottles, and family antiques in pristine condition out of a desire to keep the heritage of his family and his wife alive.
Many of the pieces reflect family histories and traditions.
“If you don’t know your past, you’ll never know your future,” Flink said.
Flink’s passion for chess started when he was 6. His father taught him the game, and he finished second in the 1969 Georgia State Chess Championship.
He owns 43 chess sets from more than 20 countries. Pieces are made of wood, ivory and pure leather.
Flink is running out of wall space for his liquor and liqueur collection. His collections room is overflowing with aged bottles of wine and liquors of all sorts: 753 bottles of wine, as old as a 47-year-old Chateau Clerc, and 3,432 miniature liquor bottles.
His collection represents rich religious and cultural traditions, with the bottle designs often reflecting their countries of origin. Flink has no interest in parting ways with any of the collection.
While preserving the wines and the miniature bottles and opting not to drink from his collection, Flink does use the hard liquors and liqueurs to create memorable entrees and desserts. Four desserts using his liqueurs have been served in high-end restaurants.
Some items in the collection help tell Flink’s own story. He keeps traditional wine pourers from Greece and Israel to reflect the heritage of himself and his wife, Vicki. Precious items in a glass display case include four generations of bar mitzvah cups, ancient oil lamps and a rare oil menorah (the only other one of its kind in Georgia is in the Breman Jewish Heritage Museum through a gift of the Flink family).
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