Skate: the Winter Ice Rink
held every winter since 2000
Every year, as November arrives, the fountains are switched off, a sheet of ice is laid across the courtyard, and Somerset House becomes the most famous skating rink in London. A tall Christmas tree stands at one end, the facades are lit in colour, and skaters glide in the cold air with the eighteenth century building rising all around them. It has been part of the city's winter since the courtyard opened in the year two thousand, and for many Londoners it is the first sign of the season.
The rink takes up most of the Fountain Court, with a raised terrace for spectators and a bar and cafe in temporary pavilions along the sides. Sessions run through the day and into the evening, and the evening ones are the most atmospheric, when the stone glows under the lights and the noise of the Strand is muffled by the walls. There are club nights with DJs, family mornings and lessons for beginners, and on quiet weekday afternoons you may find the ice almost to yourself. If you do not want to skate, the terrace lets you watch with a hot drink in hand.
Building the rink is a considerable engineering exercise, since the courtyard sits above the vaults of the Deadhouse and the ice must be laid on an insulated deck that spreads the weight. The freezing pipes are laid and flooded in stages, and the whole installation is gone by the end of January, when the fountains return. It is the clearest example of how Somerset House works today: a historic set piece reinvented as a stage for the public.
Did You Know? The ice sits on an insulated deck spread across the courtyard so that its weight does not press on the old vaults below.
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