Every year since the winter of 1989-1990, sculptors have erected a seasonal hotel made entirely of ice from the Torne River in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden. And each year, when spring came, the ice installation would melt. This year, however, brings a new era for the famous hotel, as contemporist reports. In addition to the seasonal hotel, there will be year-round lodgings made of ice.

During warmer weather, the ICEHOTEL 365 will be cooled using solar panel technology. The 22,600-square-foot hotel—with each room sculpted by a different international artist—will be kept at around 23°F year-round. Since the city is so far north, about 125 miles north of the Arctic Circle, the summer brings near-constant daylight. According to the hotel, by the end of the summer, the solar panels will harvest the equivalent of 100 consecutive days of sunshine.

The hotel will have concrete outer walls, but the inner walls will all be made of ice. The power created by all the approximately 6500 square feet of solar panels will be able to power restaurants, offices, and the warm rooms that allow guests to defrost from the icy rooms, in addition to keeping the structure from melting. The hotel notes that as climate change makes winters shorter, this system will keep the ICEHOTEL from being forced to close earlier and earlier.

And now if you can’t get a reservation in the winter, you can schedule a visit for any other time of the year.

[h/t contemporist]

All images courtesy ICEHOTEL

Research has already shown us that making art is a good stress reliever, even if your skill level is more kindergartener than Picasso. Now a new study from the University of Otago in New Zealand suggests that these mood-boosting effects can be gained from even the most straightforward crafts. As the Independent reports, knitting, baking, crocheting, and jam-making were all found to produce an “upward spiral” effect that carried over to the following day.

For the study, published last month in The Journal of Positive Psychology, researchers from the university’s department of psychology asked 658 students to record their daily experiences and emotional states in a diary for 13 days. Following the days when subjects took part in something creative, they reported feelings of positive personal growth that psychology defines as “flourishing.” In addition to crafts and cooking, researchers also cited painting, sketching, writing, musical performance, and digital design as some common creative activities students completed.

These results shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s experienced the zen-like effects of knitting a scarf or crocheting a blanket. According to the Craft Yarn Council, stress relief and creative fulfillment are the top two reasons knitters and crocheters give for partaking in the hobbies. Baking has also been touted as a form of therapy, with some mental health clinics using time in the kitchen as a treatment for depression. Another benefit of improving your mood through creativity is that the results of your labors can be shared with others—so if you’re still in need of gifts for the holidays, we suggest heading to the craft store and reaping some of the benefits yourself.

[h/t Independent]

When did human being start using containers?

Dave Consiglio:

Great question! We started making containers around 12,000 to 20,000 years ago. It may have been longer ago than that, but this is the earliest evidence.

However, it is likely that we used gourds or other natural containers even earlier than that.

But my guess is that the first “container” was a baby sling.

We’ve been making clothing since before we were even fully modern humans. The earliest clothing was almost certainly pelts (evidence for sewing is only about 40,000 years old). We probably cut holes in the pelts to make them more like clothing and less like blankets. Folding your shirt in such a way as to make carrying a baby easier seems like an indispensable improvement that almost certainly came early on in the history of clothing.

Another possibility is the use of stomachs and bladders as water containers. This innovation is also extremely old.

Fossil evidence of this is unlikely ever to be found, but our ancient ancestors had a regular supply of stomachs and bladders; it’s pretty likely that at some point one of them had the bright idea of storing water in one for use later.

OK, one final option: the fire pot. Carrying some hot coals from location to location to make fire-starting much easier is also an ancient container. Using a rock with a natural depression (or one that you carved out) would work for this, and might have been done tens of thousands of years ago.

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