"How full of the creative genius is the air in which these are generated!
I should hardly admire more if real stars fell
and lodged on my coat."
--Henry David Thoreau, 1856 [1]

<<<NEW BOOK!  The Secret Life of a Snowflake
   The Secret Life of a Snowflake describes the art and science of snowflakes, aimed at readers from 6 to 12.  Click on the book at left to see more.  See other books at Snowflake Books.

Or purchase snowflake cards, prints, and posters at the Snowflake Store.>>>

FREE!  Snowflake Wallpaper.  Put an awesome snowflake on your desktop -- guaranteed to make your computer run cooler!  Click on the size appropriate for your computer screen: 640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, 1152x864, 1280x1024, 1400x1050, 1600x1200, 1680x1050.
 

    Pictures, pictures, pictures.  Visit the three Photo Galleries to see some spectacular photographs of snow crystals. 

    Don't know a stellar dendrite from a capped column?  The Guide to Snowflakes shows different kinds of snow crystals that fall from the sky.  Browse the other links at the far left to find out more about natural snowflakes.

    We grow our own "designer" snowflakes in the lab year-round, right here in sunny Southern California.  It's part of our ongoing research into the physics of crystal growth and pattern formation.  View three generations of laboratory-grown snowflakes at our Designer Snowflake Galleries, or watch some Movies of growing snow crystals. 

    Why do snowflakes look the way they do? Check out the Snowflake Primer to learn about what snow crystals are, how they form, and why they grow into such diverse shapes.  Or visit our Frequently Asked Questions page. 

    Beyond skiing, snowboarding, and ice skating....   Here are some unique projects you can do with ice and snow.  You might try growing your own snowflake crystals, or photographing snowflakes in the wild.  Or perhaps you'd like to try your hand at creating some mysterious ice spikes right in your own home freezer.

Snowflake Stamps.  The U.S. Postal Service created a set of commemorative postage stamps in 2006 using photographs by yours truly - click on the image at right for more details.


 

[1] H. D. Thoreau, The Journal of Henry David Thoreau (edited by Bradford Torrey and Francis Allen) (Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1906; Peregrine Smith, Salt Lake City, 1984) Vol. 8, 87-88.