- Ice allows for a temporary art piece that can be expressive and awesome.

It sounds exactly like glass shattering.

When I get to carve something that came outta my head and seeing it come to fruition, there's a absolute freedom with it.

[upbeat music] - Carving ice is this absolutely incredible art form and so they are the key focal point of the festival.

- There was kids sledding down 'em, we had games, tic-tac toe, there was a corn hole.

- [Patrick] It kind of is a full circle thing where we have this beautiful landscape and we're taking this raw material, you know, water and turning into this beautiful sculpture.

And then it's also cool 'cause it just goes away and you get to remember it.

It goes back to nature, yep.

[soothing music] My name is Patrick O'Brien.

I own Ice Mill, Ice Sculptures, and Cocktail Ice located in Asheville, North Carolina Ice Mill does mainly ice sculptures, but we also do fruit, vegetable carving as well as some pumpkins, bread once in a while, and a little bit of cheese.

First time I did fruit carving, it did come pretty naturally to me.

It was fun.

I enjoyed it and my buddy remarked on it and goes, "you're a fruit ninja."

I was like, "yes, I am."

I am the only Irish ninja that that many of my friends know.

We realized as a business that fruit carving wasn't gonna support our family.

We saw an opportunity in ice to be able to transition and pick up a new skillset.

Ice sculptures are just sculptures made out of ice.

They're temporary artwork that bring amazing wow factor to events.

I'm thoroughly blessed.

I've been able to do some of the most amazing things and been in crazy places doing what I love to do for different companies, different people.

It's just been a blast.

[laughs] I sell fruit, cut up fruit, and frozen water for a living.

Go figure.

- Hey Patrick.

- Hey Corrina, how are you?

- [Corrina] I'm great, how are you?

- [Patrick] I'm wonderful, getting ready for Ice Festival.

- We are super psyched.

- Yes.

The Haywood Ice Fest is North Carolina's largest ice festival.

- Haywood County connects really well with ice because we are what's known as a headwater county, which means 100% of our water originates from within our county.

So we take that water, we turn it into art, and it seems like a really great way to highlight our communities.

How are you doing with all your ice carving in our, I think we have more than 50 sculptures this year if we count the slides and all the big ones as well.

- Yeah, they're going really well.

So this is what we got for Maggie.

This is the order that they're going out on the street.

Yeah, when we do events, you know, they're on such a large scale, you know, a 100, 150, you know, or more blocks of ice.

- I'm getting a block of ice out of the machine.

This is the foundation, this is the building block.

- [Patrick] There's a lot of just labor that goes into that.

Seriously be prepared for snow to come right there.

[tool buzzing] - [Corrina] One of these years we look at that perfect magical light dusting of snow one year.

- [Patrick] It's all hands on deck.

We are trying to do it as coordinated as possible.

- This is one block of 1, 2, 3, 3 blocks today - Producing the ice, carving all the sculptures, getting 'em packaged and ready to go.

Yeah, let's just straighten this up a little bit so that you got a little tight there.

- Yeah, yeah.

- The logo looks good.

You know, Scott's will get really good representation for their Irish coffee, it's awesome.

Vince is my production manager.

He is really my right hand man.

He is a lot further ahead of many people, that have only been carving about a year and a half, and he is really done very, very well.

I'm very proud of him.

So a lot of our sculptures start off as either something that the client wants to see or something that we suggest.

So I'll go online and find, you know, just inspiration from a picture that I like.

Of course, we have tons and tons of bears around this area, so we gotta have bears represented at the Ice Fest, we get a concept of what size it's gonna be, the general idea of the sculpture.

And then we'll either use a paper template or we'll put it on our CNC machine and make reference lines that will give us the basic drawing, the basic outline of the sculpture.

And then that's when it's, you know, the artistic part of it comes into, you know, making it go from a flat template to an actual three dimensional sculpture.

You know, we can figure out where everything needs to be with the machine, but the shape, the life of the sculpture is done by hand, you know, and that's the part that is really fun and takes a lot of, dare I say, skill.

So I'm pushing his face back a little bit.

You know, his nose will come out towards you, so I'm gonna push his cheeks back, his eye's socket back a little bit further and so his nose is more pronounced.

This business is also my passion.

I mean the more you do it, the better you get and you can do something different with each one.

I got into it because I love to carve and I still do and I still enjoy that.

More control by hand, you can actually take off more by hand than you ever would with the tools, but the tools give a really nice finish and you can do more detail, I think, with the power tools and it kind of brings me back to what I love and it gives me the mental break that I need a lot of the time.

You know, you know my favorite thing to tell people, everybody ask, "what's your favorite thing to carve?"

I say, "it's the next one."

I don't care if it's a bear, if it's a swamp, whatever, the next thing is always the most entertaining for me.

I get to do what I love and that truly helps me not stress out too much about a lot of things in this world.

Everything is North Carolina about this guy.

Mountain waters of Asheville, North Carolina, making the ice and of course, Pisgah National Forest.

Yeah, this guy screams North Carolina.

Even when I'm having the worst day ever at work, still a pretty good day.

The truck is here.

We are happy.

Now, it's load up time.

Right now, we're in really good shape for the festival.

- Right here.

- Oops, sorry.

- Today went great.

The production that came out was great.

So over the next three or four days, we will fully pack a 53 foot semi-truck with ice.

Yeah, we've got quite a bit left to do.

[soothing music] I'm gonna go straight down, watch your toes.

We're getting everything unloaded for the Haywood Ice Festival.

There we go.

Everybody's, you know, working together and making it happen.

Just getting a lot of ice off the truck, it's awesome.

Ice Festival just works in Maggie Valley because it's such a cool area.

It's synonymous with snow and skiing and then we bring in the ice element.

- We're building a slide, sit on a sled and then slide all the way down.

- This is a ice throne for people to sit on and take pictures of.

We're gonna put sculptures all the way down Main Street, different things in front of businesses that have sponsored the sculpture.

- How's it going?

- It's going in great.

We got all the pieces pre-made, which makes it substantially easier.

- Today is gonna be a lot of fun here in Waynesville for the ice block party.

We've got over 25 businesses that have commissioned their own special ice sculpture.

- One thing we really love about being part of this event is getting creative and choosing what type of ice sculpture we're gonna have represent our business.

And when you look around, every business has something unique.

We are beyond impressed, the amount of work and the amount of detail that they put into it.

It's really fun to see 'cause it's a surprise to us too.

- This year we did our Mountain Strong, which Mast General Store started after Hurricane Helene last year.

- So we definitely can't wait to see those sculptures up and down Main Street.

- [Cameraperson] Whatcha working on now?

- I am working on a big old tree frog sitting on a branch.

- I can't wait to see what the live demo guys do.

Live carving versus production carving is a different animal.

- I am on the clock, so I am just making sure that things are as good as I can get them.

- When we're production carving, there is more of you and the ice and you're trying to make the best piece possible or creating the end result.

With live demo, I mean, there's an interaction part of it.

You know, we can talk with people.

- Tell me people, how's it going?

- Good, good, awesome.

- Welcome to the Ice Fest.

- Some of my favorite moments of the Ice festival are watching any age just look in amazement at the ice sculptures.

- Ice cream.

- Oh, I love it, it's interactive.

- That's so cool.

- What I love most about the Ice Fest is that it really embraces our small town charm, art, creativity.

- Oh my goodness.

- All right.

Just hold it straight and put this up in there flush.

- I love watching the people's reaction.

That's, you know, the biggest enjoyment I get out of it is when people come out and just to enjoy a wonderful day, to have valuable time with their family.

Playing ice cornhole, riding the ice slides.

Did you see the Lego man?

Did you see this one?

Did you see the Sasquatch?

It just adds to the ambiance.

- All the snow flying all over the place.

- Yeah, everybody's just oohs and ahs and it's wonderful.

It's snowing, it's wonderful.

The ice loves it.

Everybody's having a great time.

It's great to have a winter ice festival when it's cold.

And that's probably one of the biggest goals we have with this, to make memories.

I'm ecstatic.

I think that for what we are up against this week, our team has done a fabulous job, wonderful turnout.

People seem to have a really great time.

Can't wait for next year.

- [Corrina] It's an amazing end to a ton of hard work.

[soothing music] - We know it's not gonna last forever.

You know, that sculpture that is long gone and in the river, it's a temporary thing.

You have to experience it and you get that sense of wonder, you know, you can take that experience on with you.

[soothing music]