The carnival, which been running for 11 years and is the foremost winter eventin Canterbury, is core funded by the Christchurch City Council, Montana and The Community Trust.

The event is designed to give everybody a taste of winter action in Canterbury and has something for everyone.

A Winter Village in Victoria Square will be the focus of the city-based events this year. It will feature free family fun, including winter markets, ice sculpting, arts and crafts, concerts and entertainment. The markets run on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday evenings and from 1pm on the Carnival weekend. A Carnival favourite, the annual senior citizen's concert, is on Thursday 7 August.

As well, there's five days of ski and snowboard events at seven of the region's snow sports areas and, in Methven on Friday 8 August, the Big Air event showcases a night of ski and snowboard jumping with live music and freestyle moto-cross action. Methven is an hourfs drive from Christchurch.