Every winter brings snow, ice, and the latest iteration of the ICEHOTEL. The glacial hotel, located in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden, consists of icy pavilions and rooms designed by a different architect or designer . These “art-suites,” which are hand-constructed from scratch every November/December and dismantled at the end of the season in mid-April, are all built using only a few basic materials, namely snow, ice blocks, and “snice”, a snow-ice aggregate stronger than the former and more insulating than the latter. The 1000 tons of ice blocks and 30,000 cubic meters of snice used to build the hotel are harvested from the Torne River, home to the purest ice in the world. Each of the original designs may stack ice blocks in a modular fashion and even carve them into bespoke forms, while frosty engravings and other ornament may also be incorporated. PINPIN Studio‘s current suit at ICEHOTEL has all of these elements, from doric(e) columns and an ice slab bed to powdery “murals” that grace the ceilings and side walls. More photos after the jump.

The project’s title, “Beam Me Up”, alludes to the several space ships that grace the room’s interiors. The columns are lit so as to resemble beams of lights emanating from flying saucers (the column capitals). The motif is repeated, albeit in different form, above the head of the master bed, where a halo of light fans out from under a silhouetted UFO engraved on the wall. The fur-covered bed is encased in a glowing block of ice, giving it the appearance that it’s floating above the snow-packed floor.

by Architizer Editors

posted in Uncategorized

tagged aliens, cold, ice, ICEHOTEL, PINPIN Studio, snow, suite, sweden, UFO

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