Ice Ice Baby

Popular ice carving demonstrations continue to ‘wow’ at WinterFest

BY MOSS BRENNAN

WinterFest attendees have many demonstrations they can attend, but none is quite like the ice sculpture demonstrations that will take place Saturday, Jan. 28 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. in Memorial Park.

Artisan Ice Sculptures has again joined forces with Blowing Rock WinterFest to bring their spectacular artwork to town.

Nathan Moran, owner of Artisan Ice and sculptor, has been sculpting ice for more than 20 years now and made his first appearance at Blowing Rock in 2006. Since then, the Blowing Rock WinterFest has evolved into a sculpture walk on Fridays with 25+ unique displays ranging from piggy banks full of coins to larger than life bears catching fish and Saturday with a fun live sculpting demonstration. This is always a favorite yearly event for Artisan Ice as they get to stretch our imagination and make one of a kind, amazing sculptures. The final piece this year — started from five blocks of ice — will be a large snowflake with Blowing Rock and Hendrick logos.

“I have travelled and sculpted ice and snow all over the world from the UK to Germany and Japan over the past 10 plus years as a professional Ice Sculptor but this is only my second year carving sculptures for Blowing Rock WinterFest after I moved to the States from Australia and joined Nathan’s team at Artisan Ice Sculptures as their new Lead Sculptor,” said lead sculptor at Artisan Ice Anne