Hasta La Ideas

Speaking of cutting snow, every year 16 teams from around the world travel to Colorado for the epic Breckenridge International Snow Sculpture Championships. Entrants have five days to carve 20-ton blocks of snow–using hand tools only–into a sculpture of their own design.

The first part is forming the snow into perfect blocks:

Using wooden molds, snow is made into 16 blocks weighing approximately 50,000 pounds, that’s about 400 tons of snow. “Snow stompers” climb into the block and stomp the snow to help pack it down. The process is repeated until the mold is full and packed into a sculpt-able block.

Then the carving starts:

Teams then sculpt for five days using only hand tools- including vegetable peelers, chicken wire, small saws and more. Power tools, colorants and internal support structures are prohibited.

Here’s video of the teams in action:

Up next: The breathtaking finished sculptures.