In the Swedish Lapland, 200 km north of the Arctic Circle, sleep in a hotel entirely constructed from ice. The room is made from snow while the bed and all decorations are pieces of art, carved from solid ice. Just a thick reindeer skin and a warm sleeping bag are between you and the ice. Staying at the world’s largest ice hotel is an unforgettable experience. Sleep soft.
The hotel melts away each year in the spring and each year it is rebuilt in early winter.
The WINTER OF 2021 HOTEL is now open with the creations of 34 artists selected for the WINTER 2021 version of the 2,870 square-meter seasonal hotel. It consists of 12 art suites, 24 ice rooms and one ceremonial hall.
UPDATED DEC 16, 2021: See update at the bottom of this post
Kiruna town, 145 km north of the Arctic Circle, is the gateway to Sweden’s famous ice hotel. Made from ice and snow each year, the world’s first hotel made from ice is located about 17 km from Kiruna in the beautiful small village of Jukkasjärvi along the Torne River.
ICEHOTEL was founded by Yngve Bergqvist back in 1989/1990 and has been built and rebuilt every winter since then. First opened in 1990, the hotel melts away each year in the spring and each year it is rebuilt in early winter.
Inspired by the Japanese ice sculpting tradition in Sapporo, Japan, the founder of Sweden’s ice hotel invited a few Japanese artists in 1989 to attend an ice sculpting workshop in Sweden’s northern village of Jukkasjärvi. In follow-up, a few weeks later a French artist held an exhibition of ice art in an igloo in the same area.
As there were not enough rooms at hotels in town, some visitors had to overnight in sleeping bags on top of reindeer skins in the cold exhibition hall of the icy igloo. They all thought it was a very cool experience and so the idea of an ice hotel was born.
The first group of overnight guests to stay at the new ice hotel, styled as ICEHOTEL, was a specialist survival group of the Swedish Armed Forces.
It is now the biggest hotel of ice and snow in the world spanning over some 6,000 square metres, though it varies year to year as the architecture of the hotel can be changed each year.
The first conference group to sleep in the -5°C atmosphere on a bed of soft reindeer skins were guests from Versatel, an International space satellite company. Since then, more than 50,000 guests have had the very same thrilling and exhilarating experience every winter at Sweden’s ICEHOTEL.
During late winter or early spring each year, crystal clear blocks of ice are cut from the nearby frozen Torne River. Approximately 9 million kg of ice and 27 million kg of snow are then stored in a nearby cold production hall where about 50 invited artists spend hours and hours creating the most amazing structures, furniture, decorations, and statues out of the ice.
Even the large chandeliers in the hotel lobby are carved from ice.
In early winter these art pieces are used to decorate the rooms which each have a unique theme with unique works of ice carved art.
When cold enough, around November, snow is sprayed on huge inverted catenary-shaped steel forms and allowed to freeze. Once frozen, the forms are removed, which leaves the freestanding corridors. Dividing walls are then built to create rooms and suites. While the thick walls, floors and ceilings are made from a combination of solid packed snow and crystal clear ice, all the furniture such as the chairs and beds and all decorations are artistically sculpted from large blocks of ice.
So while the snow is mainly used for building the structures, the ice is used for creating the interior designs of the themed rooms and icy furniture as well as the ice glasses, or rather the tumblers, at the Absolute (Swedish vodka brand) Ice Bar. Tumblers are used only once and users are allowed and encouraged to throw their ice tumbler to pieces against the bar’s inside ice wall.
Mostly everything inside the hotel is made of ice, with the exception of the washroom facilities which are located in a separate permanent building.
Guests sleep in polar-tested sleeping bags on ice beds covered with reindeer furs. It’s a cool experience as, obviously, there is no heating, so the bedroom temperatures are constantly around -5°C. While there is no plumbing in the ICEHOTEL, washrooms, sauna and a hot tub are available either outdoors or in a separate permanent building.
The hotel opens in phases. The first phase opens in the beginning of December and for each week, another part of the hotel opens up for guests until the beginning of January, when the entire construction is completed.
When completed, the hotel features a bar, chapel, main hall, restaurant, reception area, plus about 70 rooms and suites for over 100 guests. The lovely ice chapel is part of the Swedish Church’s local parish of the nearby Jukkasjärvi village.
Every winter many couples get married here and several children have been baptised in the chapel.
If you are planning to stay here, come between December and March but avoid peak times over Christmas and New Year as the rooms are premium priced and booked out long in advance.
Depending on the weather, the hotel will be evacuated and left to melt down anytime from late March to early April. With some luck, it will still be standing against the warming spring weather in late April or even early May. Once the hotel starts to melt down, it all runs back into the Torne River and where once stood a large hotel, is then just a big patch of green grass.
The hotel offers a variety of activities for their guests. In addition to just walking in and around the hotel to marvel this architectural wonder (it is listed as one of The Seven Wonders of Sweden), eating or drinking at the bar and restaurant, you can also participate in snowmobiling, ice sculpting classes, dogsledding, horseback riding, Sami (Lapland people) cultural tours, and extreme winter driving with a MINI Cooper car.
However, on very cold winter nights when the sky is clear, look up for the most incredible light show on earth. The northern hemisphere’s aurora borealis lights up the skies with the dancing sheets of lights called the “northern lights”. The 16th century mathematician, Galileo Galilei, called them aurora borealis named after Aurora, the Roman goddess of dawn, and Boreas the Greek name for the northern wind. The aurora borealis is caused by the collision of high-velocity bursts of solar wind and magnetospheric charged particles with the earth’s magnetic field in its high altitude atmosphere
Going there in summer? While the full-size ICEHOTEL will be nowhere in sight, don’t despair. In 2016, “ICEHOTEL 365”, a permanent site within the hotel fitted with solar-powered cooling technology was launched. Open all-year-round, it features a bar, an art gallery and several suites.
The summers in Lapland are quite intense which creates wonderful outdoor activities. The sun burns for 100 days and nights without setting and the countryside turns from snow to vibrant green. Enjoy the wilderness of northern Lapland.
UPDATED DEC 16, 2021:
It has been reported that in early December 2021 Sweden’s ICEHOTEL launched its 32nd incarnation with a touch of royal magic when it unveiled a brand new suite designed by Prince Carl Philip of Sweden and his business partner Oscar Kylberg.
(PHOTO by Magnus Mårding)
Named “Midsummer Night’s Dream,” the deluxe suite features floral elements and plants, a first for the iconic hotel, the walls of the suite are adorned with ice blocks filled with colourful flowers and fauna, while a stunning ice chandelier light with flowers inside hangs from the ceiling.
“What better way to show the true character of the ice than to encapsulate the most delicate and beautiful Swedish midsummer flowers in an arctic environment? For us Swedes, midsummer, and especially midsummer’s night, is filled with myth and legend.” Prince Carl Philip and Kylberg said in a statement.
Their statement continues with “The Scandinavian nature that surrounds us flowers and ice plays a huge part in our cultural upbringing and has a bearing on who we are as Nordic people as Scandinavians. Hopefully, our vision with the suite ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ will invite you also to be a part of us.”
The pair are among the 32 artists selected to create the latest version of the 2,870 square-meter seasonal hotel, which consists of 12 art suites, 24 ice rooms and one ceremonial hall this time around.
☛ Read more: Posts of Sweden
Blog post and photos by Peter who has been travelling almost full-time since 2005 and has been to over 122 countries. He visited several countries, such as Japan, more than 20 times. Peter is Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of GlobeRovers Magazine, an independent travel magazine focused on intrepid destinations.