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Russian ice sculpture boasts opulent traditions. In fact, it dates back to the times when the famous «Ice House» of the Empress Anna Ioannovna was constructed to commemorate the 10th anniversary of her ruling.
This custom was brought back to life again in the modern Russian history – in 1987 a grand ice palace was built touching off an ambiguous reaction among the Muscovites. However, the genuine triumph of ice sculpture fell at 1999 when Moscow witnessed the construction of a replica of the Ivan the Great Bell Tower – 18 m high, it became the highest Russian sculpture ever.
These traditions have found its new embodiment in the Russian Ice Sculpture Gallery recently opened on the territory of the picturesque Krasnaya Presnya park and proclaimed the first Russian museum of the kind. The unique Ice Palace occupies the territory of over 500 sq m housing a whole host of ice personages, each of them coming off the pages of the well-known and beloved Russian fairytales by A.S. Pushkin, P.P. Ershov and unfading fables by Krylov. Here you will meet the Squirrel cracking nuts, Baba Yaga’s izba, 33 epic heroes in the ice array and many other famous characters. The guests abandon the hot summer day for a while and stop to find themselves in the Snow Queen’s Kingdom where the time halts giving us the chance to fully revel in the fantastic sight, plunge into the mysterious and tantalizing atmosphere of the Ice Kingdom, feast our eyes on dim and suffused lustre, intricate outlines of the stark constructions and figures, as well as the masterly skill and talent of the creators.
Over 90 tons of pure ice produced from spring water was used when furnishing the ice interior of the hall including the sculptures. The centre of the hall is accentuated by an ice throne, a replica of the one from the Ice House of Anna Ioannovna. The leading sculptors of the country worked at the construction of the ice masterpieces, while the hall of the gallery was decorated by the renowned stage designers. One of the features of the gallery is its original light and musical setting contributing to the atmosphere of a fairytale alive.
The gallery is open for the visitors all the year round – due to special technologies, the temperature here never goes down -10 degrees, so the ice «creatures» stay sound even in summer. For the guests not to get frozen in such conditions, they are provided with warm clothing.
Several times a month the Gallery holds master-classes, when the public watches a sculpture being cut out of a chunk ice later to become part of the exposition.    
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