Year: 1949
Language: English
Runtime: 10 min
Director: Douglas Wilkinson
Producer: Michael Spencer
Writer: Douglas Wilkinson
Cinematographer: Chester Kissik
Editor: Neil Harris
Production Company: National Film Board of Canada

One of three films in Douglas Wilkinson’s Arctic Notebook series (Arctic Dog Team and Across Arctic Ungava are the others), this classic example of the ethnographic record film has been seen by millions. A demonstration of igloo-building in Canada’s Far North, it shows how the site is selected and how blocks of snow are used to make a shelter in only an hour and a half. How to Build an Igloo was once the lone Canadian inclusion in an international catalogue of films on architecture.

By: Peter Morris