The Weirdest Stuff We've Seen Frozen in Ice at Events

IFC hosted the season 3 premiere for Portlandia in New York in 2012, where the space was filled with ice sculptures and quirky centerpieces. The event's central installation was a 5½- by 5½-foot block of ice containing a frozen bike.

As a playful nod to Portland's many coffee shops, the Portlandia event's bar had a sculpture with mugs and tea pots frozen in ice.

To entice Chicagoans to visit Florida this winter, Greater Fort Lauderdale hosted a warm-weather-themed pop-up promotion on Pioneer Court Plaza in February. Called "Hello Sunny," the event allowed guests to pose behind swim trunks and bikinis frozen in blocks of ice. The quirky sculptures played off of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention and Tourism Bureau's "Defrost Your Swimsuit" campaign.

This month's 10th anniversary bash for Toronto event venue the Carlu froze fish in ice blocks to create a chandelier for the seafood station. Plexiglass reservoirs placed below the fixture caught drips from the eye-catching piece.

A Fortune 500 telecommunications company hosted a weeklong incentive program in Miami in 2012, and an icy evening bash at Loews Miami Beach Hotel closed it all out. Fourth Wall Events brought a sparkling-ice-castle vibe to the ballroom, and each table got a fitting centerpiece: a 75-pound block of ice that held a frozen, single red rose. Crystal bands wrapped the base of each centerpiece, and traces of dry ice on top slowed down melting and gave off ribbons of fog.

At Vogue Eyewear’s launch party in Los Angeles, flowers and glasses encased in blocks of ice made for striking arrangements on bar tops. The event’s chic, steal-worthy ideas were courtesy of designer Bronson van Wyck.

The Toronto launch party for the spring/summer edition of Canada’s Sharp magazine style book displayed the books frozen into a four-inch-thick wall of crystal-clear ice that measured 40 by 60 inches. Etched into the ice wall and packed with white snow was the book’s title, The Book for Men.

At a 2008 Kentucky Derby event, an In Touch ice sculpture had frozen rose bouquets inside.

At Veuve Clicquot’s 2005 New York launch party for its new Ice Jacket—a neoprene sleeve meant to keep champagne cold—Ice Fantasies kept bottles in the new neoprene sleeve especially cool while frozen in ice.

At the James Beard Awards in New York last year, a water bar on the terrace displayed Pellegrino and Acqua Panna bottles frozen inside an ice sculpture.

At BizBash's own Event Style Awards back in 2003, Ice Art's giant ice bar had shrimp and lobsters frozen inside.

More ice cube than ice sculpture, but still fun: For this year’s 85th Academy Awards, New York program director Patrick Harrison tapped Daniel Boulud and his Upper East Side restaurant Daniel to host 130 academy members, film industry insiders, and friends for canapés, cocktails, and a three-course dinner. The evening’s specialty cocktail (pictured) was the Red Carpet, a mix of pear-infused vodka, St. Germain, and champagne, complete with a paper Oscar statuette frozen inside an ice cube.