Ephemeral Screen Printed Ice Decorates a Room at Sweden’s Ice Hotel

Each year, Sweden’s famous <a href="http://www.icehotel.com/" target="_blank">Ice Hotel</a> invites artists from around the world to submit proposals to design their very own rooms within the <a href="http://inhabitat.com/quebecs-hotel-de-glace-is-a-sculpted-winter-wonderland-escape-made-of-ice-and-snow/">snow hotel</a>. This year, artists <a href="http://esztersziksz.blogspot.com" target="_blank">Eszter Augustine-Sziksz</a> and Nikkila Carroll transformed a room into a vision of <a href="http://inhabitat.com/javier-riera-illuminates-the-landscape-with-ephemeral-geometric-light-projections/" target="_blank">ephemeral beauty</a>, aptly named ILLUMINATED. The pair brought their unique screenprints on ice to the hotel, creating stained glass windows that will disappear with the Spring sun.

Lit with blue <a href="http://inhabitat.com/datagrove-is-a-vibrant-led-illuminated-interactive-installation-of-whispering-branches-in-california/" target="_blank">glowing LED lights</a>, Sziksz and Carroll’s designs are backlight by the sun during the day.

Scattered across an arched wall, Sziksz’s screen prints act as tiny port holes. Each is made up of a smooth circular piece of ice, cut with a chainsaw from the nearby river.

The artist then prepares each of the ice discs by ironing them, gently melting them to a flat surface which will receive ink in a continuous tone.

Once prepared, the ice discs are then screen printed with Sziksz’s imagery- finger prints, vintage portraits and silhouettes are temporarily attached to the frozen pieces. In the <a href="http://inhabitat.com/new-post-submission-2246/" target="_blank">freezing temperature of the hotel</a>, the screen printed ice will last the season, but once the weather warms up, each artwork will melt away.

To coincide with the dream-like feeling of the ice circles, the team designed a three dimensional cloud mural for the walls of the room. Using a projector, the clouds were carved from the packed snow, surrounding the glowing ice bed. A faux-window was carved on the opposite wall, overlooking a cloudscape that is illuminated with blue light projections.

The ILLUMINATED room continues the <a href="http://inhabitat.com/photos-inhabitat-spends-the-night-in-quebecs-hotel-de-glace-made-entirely-from-ice/" target="_blank">Ice Hotel</a>'s tradition of creating a fantastical winter experience, fusing art, design and the beauty of snow architecture.