Sweden is continuing to make traveling to the Arctic even more exciting by constructing the next generation of its famed Icehotel on the banks of the Torne River.
The 23rd version of the Icehotel is being built with huge two-ton ice blocks and is due to be complete later this month. The management keeps the cost of the project secret. The interior design alone is estimated at around $750,000. The paradox is that the whole massive ice structure will melt when spring comes.
"We're completely dependent on the weather, we have a schedule to adhere to but it varies from year to year," Icehotel representative Beatrice Karlsson told AFP.
Despite the inevitable destruction in the end of the season, builders are working against the clock in sub zero conditions to complete the Jukkasjärvi ice hotel of 65 rooms, a lobby, a reception, main hall, an ice bar and a chapel in time, AFP reports. The furniture and other interior decorations will also be carved of ice.
An international team of artists has been selected to decorate the 16 suites of the hotel. Themes and designs are kept a secret until the opening.
The ice for the enormous structure is being pulled from the river, where the water returns after the hotel melts.
"In March, 5,000 tonnes of ice are pulled from the river and then conserved in two-tonne blocks in two warehouses where the temperature is maintained at between minus eight and minus five degrees Celsius," the man responsible for the hotel’s interior design Jens Thoms Ivarsson says.
The costs of rooms at the unusual hotel vary between $330 and $1000 per night. People can get a tour of the hotel for just $50.
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