Glacier and Mountains, Alaska
Travelling south along the coast of Alaska, we encountered many technicolour panoramas of this sort. Funny isn’t it that after seeing some gorgeous things repeatedly, the viewer becomes jaded to the spectacular.
It is a long stretch between Sir Elton John and a cruise ship, but ice is common to both. Let me explain.
It is ironic that after seeing ice chunks calving from the main glacier in Glacier Bay, Alaska, we returned inside for an ice carving exhibition. Chips of ice whiz through the air as the small, brown-skinned man crushes the giant chisel into the block of ice.
Working as any good sculptor would, he shapes the large volumes. Bit by chip he refines the more intricate pieces, changing as he goes to ever smaller chisels or knives. Head down with intense concentration, this kitchen specialist releases a swan or porpoise from the clear ice block. An hour later the sculpture is complete. After wowing the crowd, he bows to the spectators and in no time he and a few helpers clear away all the tools, debris, table and finished project.
This wizard shaping the block of ice puts me in mind of a personal connection that I have to the ice forming operation. Several years ago, I met a man who lived in Grand Bend whose business was ice. He worked insane hours to carve ice sculptures for weddings, anniversaries and company events.
Although this fellow was a customer of mine, I really got to know him because my good friend, Ed, helped him to create swans and other creatures, not out of ice but out of clear plastic. Once created and sprayed with water, these animals glistened exactly like an ice sculpture that had only just started to melt. These pieces could be reused and of course were cheaper. They were however not ice sculpture and the market, it would seem, demands real ice.
Julian Bayley, my acquaintance from Lake Huron, has an ice plant in Hensall, Ontario. He was determined to solve the problem of real ice sculpture. After all, there is a $150 million world-wide market for ice sculpture.
For a celebrity blow-out like Elton John's annual White Tie and Tiara charity gala at his mansion near Windsor Castle, extraordinary touches like ice sculptures are necessary. This June 450 guests nibbled on caviar hors d'oeuvres served on ice trays. Julian through his business, Ice Culture, supplied those dishes. The trays cut by hand would demand an hour's work by a skilled craftsman. Using computer-aided machinery, Julian's staff made 12 of these identical three-part dishes out of one slab of ice in 30 minutes. They wholesale for a mere $7.00 a piece.
Shipping his creations packed in dry ice as far as Australia is producing a very comfortable living for this British-born, former advertising man. Much of his work of course is destined for the U.S.
Techniques for ice making have been developed step by step. Pour water into a mould and freeze it, and the result will be semi-opaque, not suitable for a sparkling diamond clean work of art. To start, he freezes water from the bottom up, forcing bubbles and impurities to the surface.
Walking through his plant, I was staggered by the size not only of the freezers with their precise temperature controls but also by the routers that can produce a company logo in 20 minutes. That same item used to take over three hours to be cut by hand.
Twenty-seven people man this 32,000 square foot refrigerated warehouse, producing specialty items for Ketel One vodka, BMW and many other corporations that have found one of his adverts in the Yellow Pages. Julian also gives away many pieces as a way of spreading the word. Ottawa's Winterlude festival, a recipient of Julian's generosity, in turn generated a number of high level referrals.
All this high tech manufacturing with its computer-guided routers and lathes is a long way from the pastry chef on your favourite cruise ship, but I guess there is room for both.