Saturday, September 10, 2016
 

A cube of ice, weighing about ten tons (about 9000 kg) and measuring 80 inches (2m) per side, is melting in Seattle, Washington's Occidental Park. The temporary art installation, set up yesterday morning, "showcases the stages of the natural water cycle as the ice shifts from opaque to translucent", the artists said.

The project is part of the Seattle Design Festival, and was designed by Olson Kundig Architects' Clay Anderson, Noah Conlay, Jarri Hasnain, Gregory Nakata, and Mark Olthoff. Crews began assembling blocks yesterday  morning and had stacked all 64 blocks in place by 8:00 am. 

It is not certain how long the 64 blocks of ice that make up the cube will take to melt, and discovering how the process unfolds is part of the intent. Olson Kundig contacted University of Washington meteorologist Cliff Mass to try to estimate the time it would take to melt, which Mass called "not a trivial calculation". He said the variables included how much sun warms the block, in turn dependent on cloud cover; condensation on the block's surface, thus variables like humidity, temperature, and wind; and heat conduction, both from the ground and from the surrounding air. 
The installation inspired photographers at The Seattle Times, and under the hashtag #ok_icecube at Instagram and Twitter.


Sister links
 Category:Occidental Park


Sources

Benjamin Woodard, Jr.. There's a 10-ton ice cube melting in Seattle's Occidental Park — The Seattle Times, September 9, 2016
Kurt Schlosser. Freeze! There's a 10-ton block of ice melting in Seattle right now and there are pictures — Geekwire, September 9, 2016
Alan Berner. Occidental Park's 10-ton ice cube: Catch it while you can — The Seattle Times, September 9, 2016
 Ice Cube — Olson Kundig Architects, September 9, 2016 (date of access)
Dyer Oxley. How long will it take this giant ice cube to melt in Seattle? — MyNorthwest.com, September 9, 2016
Cliff Mass. Perhaps the World's Biggest Ice Cube will Be Installed in a Seattle Park. How Fast Will It Melt? — Blogspot, September 4, 2016


External links
Instagram hashtag
Twitter hashtag
Map and coordinates: 47.600306,-122.333089