Ice Palace Grand Lighting Kicks Off Polar Fest this Weekend

DETROIT LAKES (KDLM) – Polar Fest officially begins, Friday with the grand lighting of the Ice Palace on the Detroit Lakes City Beach.

Volunteers harvested around 2,000 blocks of ice from the lake to create this year’s Ice Palace. The palace is around 95 feet long, 24 feet deep and 32 feet high. That’s nearly double the length of the first ice palace built in 2018.

The grand lighting ceremony will take place on Friday at 7 p.m. and officially kick off seventeen days of Polar Fest events including two nights of frozen fireworks. The first on Saturday, Feb. 12 to kick off the first weekend of Polar Fest and the second on Saturday, Feb. 26 to close things out. Shows will be at 7 pm along the Detroit Lakes City Beach.

Kelcey Klemm, Detroit Lakes City Administrator says the Ice Palace along with the Polar Fest activities have a large economic impact in Detroit Lakes, “We see sales up the liquor store, we see food and beverage tax sales up in February, in the middle of winter that’s just tremendous to have that type of economic impact in Detroit Lakes.”

Polar Fest is held annually in February. It was created and run by an independent, all-volunteer committee in Detroit Lakes.