Discover the Art of Snow Sculpting: Festivals & Champions

You may be tempted to dismiss sculpting in the snow as something kids do in the backyard. In fact, Snow Sculpting is widely considered a legitimate art.

Illuminated snow sculptures featuring intricate designs and vibrant colors, displayed at night. — From the World Snow Celebration in Stillwater, Minnesota

The Minneapolis Institute of Art, for example, has scheduled a panel discussion for January, 2026 with master snow carvers from Denmark, Mexico, and Turkey who will be in Minnesota along with other global teams for the prestigious annual World Snow Sculpting Championship .

This video is a good overview of the annual championship in nearby Stillwater. Here is that competition’s main link.

This is the 2025 winning entry, built by a team from Mongolia. Canada won in 2024,

A large, intricately carved snow sculpture depicting a Native American figure with an expressive facial expression, surrounded by people at the World Snow Sculpting Championship. — This sculpture by Team Mongolia won the 2025 snow sculpting competition in Stillwater, Minnesota

Three individuals dressed in winter attire pose in front of a large snow sculpture resembling a mountain goat, with a snowy landscape and a bridge in the background. — The 2024 1st Place Canadian team (called the FjordWitches – Fanny-Fay Tremblay-Girard, Joelle Gagnon and Marie-Claude-Paris-Tanguay) with their sculpture of a milky sea monster from “the abyss of the Saguenay fjord”

A similar competition has run for three decades in Breckenridge, Colorado, with 12 teams from around the world each given identical blocks of snow. See this video from 2024 for more.

Intricate snow sculptures displayed at a winter competition, featuring various artistic designs against a clear blue sky. — Above, a Breckenridge competition sculpture from 2019 (via Instagram here)

For Canadians, and hundreds of thousands of international visitors, the Quebec Winter Carnival held annually in February has snow and ice sculpting of note, including buildings made of ice, along with endless other winter activities. (Below, a typical group of festival carvings)

Visitors admiring large, intricate snow sculptures of animals and mythical creatures illuminated against a twilight sky, with trees and festive decorations in the background.

Canada has other major winter festivals that feature snow sculpting, including:

Winterlude in Ottawa/Gatineau – January 30 to February 16, 2026

Festival du Voyageur, Winnipeg – February 13 to 22, 2026

Snow Days Festival, Lake Louise, Alberta – Jan. 16 – Feb. 8, 2026

Smaller winter festivals right across the country almost always include snow sculpting or ice carving, no matter how compact the event. These are welcome celebrations of community artistry every winter.