Sapporo Snow Festival

In 1950 local secondary school students built six snow statues in Odori Park, and the event drew a crowd far larger than expected. The festival was repeated and grew each year. From 1955 units of the Ground Self-Defense Force stationed in Sapporo began building large sculptures, bringing heavy machinery and the manpower that made the monumental snow structures possible.

The 1972 Winter Olympics in Sapporo brought the festival international attention, and from 1974 an International Snow Sculpture Contest has invited teams from other countries and regions. A second site at the Makomanai Self-Defense Force base hosted large sculptures for decades until it closed in 2005; the family-oriented site moved and has been held at the Tsudome sports hall in Higashi ward since 2009.

Each site has its own character, and together they span the city centre and a suburban venue.

Building begins about a month before the festival. Large quantities of clean snow are brought by truck from the mountains and suburbs around Sapporo, as the snow in the city centre is too dirty. For the biggest pieces, wooden frames are erected and the snow packed into them in layers, then left to harden before carving. Teams of Self-Defense Force personnel, civic volunteers and professional sculptors work with shovels, saws and chisels, often through the night.

Within a day or two of the festival's end, heavy machinery demolishes the sculptures for safety reasons, and the park is cleared.

Sapporo in early February is cold, with daytime temperatures usually below freezing and packed snow and ice on the pavements. Warm layers, gloves and footwear with a good grip, or detachable ice cleats, are recommended. The Odori sculptures can be seen free of charge at any hour, and many visitors come twice, once by day and once to see them lit at night.

Hotels in Sapporo are in high demand during festival week. Other Hokkaido winter events around the same time include the Otaru Snow Light Path, where the canal city is lit by snow lanterns, and the Asahikawa Winter Festival.