The Freezing History of Ice Hotels

Ice hotels have been the top destination for an extraordinary experience of our time, as it is a bucket-list destination that displays unique art, immersive winter activities, and a chance to sleep inside a fully structured ice building for the night. These sub-zero hotels are only temporary and are mainly in countries such as Sweden, Canada, Norway, and Finland. It offers a unique arctic stay before melting back into nature in spring. Ice hotels are mainly located in colder climate areas as it is a building that is completely made of snow ice blocks and compact snow. Guests sleep in sub-zero temperatures on beds topped with reindeer skins and warm sleeping bags, with amenities including ice glasses and furniture, influencing guests to add this destination into their bucket-list. These have successfully transformed a frigid concept into a luxurious, artistic, and adventurous travel trend, drawing global interest. Ice hotel accommodations have an interesting history that morphed regular ice sculptures into hotels.

The ice hotel concept was first introduced in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden, in 1989 with an ice art exhibition made by Japanese ice sculptors and Yngve Bergqvist. This led to the first functional hotel in 1990 after visitors of French artist Jannot Derid’s art gallery slept in the igloo art gallery due to the lack of rooms. This was because all of the cabins in the village near the art gallery were all booked and a group of visitors needed a place to stay for the night. The guests who were staying in the Arctic Hall received specific instructions and warm sleeping bags. This established the concept of temporary, annually rebuilt structures made from ice and snow and parked an idea for an ice hotel. Yngve Bergqvist was an entrepreneur who realized the potential for an annual, artistic winter structure; this idea led him to create the first official ice hotel. What started as a simple idea that sparked his mind turned into an Arctic adventure, globally famous.