The Ice Elephant melts away to highlight the decline of the Asian Elephant Ice Box supports the Elephant Family, Elephant Parade Mela June 30th 2010, Royal Hospital Gardens, Chelsea.

The Elephant Parade has taken over London in the last few months, showcasing an amazing collection of creative works by various leading artists and designers who have personalised these beautiful and wonderful elephants.

Inspired by the Parade and a recent visit to India, seeing Elephants in the wild, Philip Hughes the owner of The Ice Box, offered the Elephant Family their very own bespoke ice elephant sculpture. Hand carved and sculpted from crystal clear ice for their Mela celebration on 30th June at the Chelsea Hospital, the new edition to the collection was designed to assist in delivering a powerful message regarding the decline of the elephants.

The ice elephant is exactly the same size as the models that the various artists have created, now displayed at the Royal Hospital Gardens. It took a team of two sculptors over 24 hours to hand carve and create the elephant, working at -10 degrees celsius in their London based studio. The ice artists chose to carve the standing elephant with its trunk extending upward - known for good luck!

The elephant ice sculpture weighs approximately 1.7 tons, created from 15 120kg individual blocks of clear ice.

Philip Hughes, Managing Director, Ice Box said, “After seeing these majestic creatures in the wild, I was thrilled to be able to assist this amazing charity which is working to save the decline of the Asian elephant’s habitat. The Ice Elephant sculpture melting accentuates the powerful message about how serious the decline in the number of these elephants has become”.

Information on the Elephant Family Charity can be found at www.elephantfamily.org

Photos from the Elephant Parade auction, attended by Liz Hurley and fundraiser host, Goldie Hawn, can be found here.

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