Castles, conquests and royalty will reign over the Michigan Technological University campus as students invite fellow Huskies and visitors to take in "Dragons, Knights, and Legendary Sights" during Winter Carnival 2025.
Campus and community will gather Feb. 5-8 for Michigan Tech's annual Winter Carnival, now in its second century. In addition to the event's renowned snow statues and other traditional events, a laser show befitting this year's medieval theme is among the spectacles to look forward to.
The laser show will be projected onto the exterior of the Walker Arts and Humanities Center, located near the Michigan Tech broomball rinks. It will take place directly after the Alumni All Stars Broomball Game on Wednesday, Feb. 5., with a tentative 11:15 p.m. start time.
Winter Carnival Schedule
In addition to month-long and one-night snow statue construction, students compete throughout Winter Carnival in contests that would do King Arthur's knights proud. From human ice bowling and tug-of-war to the Stage Revue, keep up with all the events on the Michigan Tech Winter Carnival website.
That's far from late for the Winter Carnival All-Nighter, where statue builders will continue on through the evening. After the laser show, the campus dance party will just be getting started with the help of giant snow speakers, which have become nearly as iconic as the snow statues themselves.
No matter what the weather brings, the campus vibe will be warm and bright thanks to the fire cages interspersed across campus. Commissioned by Blue Key National Honor Society, the organizers of Winter Carnival, they were made by Tech's mechanical engineering technology Senior Design team. Firewood will be supplied by the Forestry Club of Tech's College of Forest Resources and Environmental Science.
The All-Nighter begins at 4 p.m. Wednesday and continues into the early hours of Thursday. During the night, more than 70 snow statues built on and around campus will either receive their finishing touches in the month-long category or be built from scratch in the all-night category, with judging set to begin at 9 a.m. Thursday morning.
Blue Key member Brynn Santi '26, who leads the Winter Carnival statue committee, said the biggest challenge, as always, is adjusting to the mercurial whims of Mother Nature.
"The hardest part of building snow statues is the weather and if it will cooperate with us or not," said Santi, noting that from Thursday, Jan. 16, through Wednesday, Jan. 22, organizations in the month-long category couldn't work on their statues. "First it was too warm to build and then temperatures plummeted, making it too cold to build," she said.
This year I have not had to worry about getting enough snow. We definitely have more than enough. We just need it to stay a little warmer so people can be out building in safe temperatures.
Statue construction is governed by rules to ensure both safety and fairness. In addition to watching the thermometer, statue committee members keep an eye on sites throughout the building process to ensure precautionary safety measures are taken — like students wearing hard hats when working with scaffolding.
Campus and community members serving as snow statue judges also follow a strict set of criteria.
"Some things the judges look for that are important are that no machinery is being used for the construction of these beautiful statues and that a boundary to the statue is present at the time of judging," said Santi. Judges also consider the statue's proportions, the whiteness of the snow used, the statue's intricacy, how fitting the caption is for the entry, the entry's originality and how well it fits the Winter Carnival theme.
Slushing and Mushing into Winter Carnival 2025
For some Huskies, this will be their first go at building a snow statue. Santi has advice.
"Go into building with a plan — and plan to use more snow than you need, so if you make a mistake when sculpting you can fix it easily and not have to restart," she said. "If you're using water, wear waterproof clothing and wait for your statue to freeze fully before you try to sculpt it."
Her top tip: "Have fun with it, even though things probably will not go as you planned," said Santi. "The most important part of Winter Carnival is that everyone has a good time! If you have questions or concerns, Blue Key members will be making rounds all night and will do their best to help you."
Santi said statues are her favorite part of Winter Carnival because they make Michigan Tech and its Blue Key chapter unique.
"I was just at a national Blue Key conference in Arizona and was approached by someone from another chapter asking about our statues because they had seen them on their TikTok page," she said. "The statues are just so fun to build and work together on while taking a break from school! We enjoy all the snow we get in an interesting way that no other campus does."
If statues are her favorite thing about Winter Carnival, mushing surely comes in second. Santi, a third-year human biology major minoring in pre-health and public health, is vice president of the Michigan Tech Mushing Club. The club partners with Otter River Sled Dog Training Center and Wilderness Adventures owner Tom Bauer. Through its treasured relationship with the center, all Huskies are welcome to participate in real-life learning about how to care for sled dogs. There are also opportunities to train for and participate in races.
As they have for Carnivals past, the Mushing Club and Otter River are partnering to offer free sled dog rides from 2-5 p.m. on Friday and Saturday during Winter Carnival. The event takes place in front of Douglass Houghton Hall on the east side of campus.
The first-of-its-kind mushing club, which formed in 2018, is excited to experience another first this year: participating in the All-Nighter statue competition. Although she will be busy with her Blue Key duties and unable to join the build, it's still a full-circle moment for Santi. Mushing Club is the reason she joined Blue Key.
"My first year with the club, we offered sled dog rides at Carnival and really enjoyed it. But we wanted to make some changes to the track, and I thought, 'What better way to improve things than to join the organization that puts it on?' I also wanted to be a part of an organization that puts on such a big event for the community and for campus," said Santi. She feels good about improvements she's helped institute through her own knowledge and after listening to feedback from fellow students.
Santi, who came to Tech for the "smaller campus feeling and the ability to know my professors one-to-one," said the University experience has lived up to her expectations. "Knowing my professors has helped me in many situations — they are happy to work with you if you have any issues. The campus itself is beautiful, and I love winter so this was the perfect option," she said.
Michigan Technological University is a public research university founded in 1885 in Houghton, Michigan, and is home to nearly 7,500 students from more than 60 countries around the world. Consistently ranked among the best universities in the country for return on investment, Michigan’s flagship technological university offers more than 120 undergraduate and graduate degree programs in science and technology, engineering, computing, forestry, business, health professions, humanities, mathematics, social sciences, and the arts. The rural campus is situated just miles from Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, offering year-round opportunities for outdoor adventure.
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