There’s romance to two ounces of whiskey poured over a giant cube of ice. It’s absolutely aesthetic: there’s a novelty to a large chunk of frozen water in a glass.

To Chris Bonds, owner of Grand Valley Ice, however, there’s more to it than just good looks.

“I wouldn’t say I’m a water nerd exactly,” he says, standing in front of a 350-pound block of crystal-clear ice. Though not a self proclaimed water nerd, he grew up with a deep appreciation for the resource, thanks to his father’s involvement in the Rural Water Association. Reflecting on his childhood, he even muses about the dwindling snowfall in northern Mississippi over the course of his lifetime.

This, paired with living in one of the best municipal water sources in the nation (Grand Junction recently placed second in North America for Best Tasting Water according to the American Water Works Association), led Bonds to create a startup focused on crafting high-quality cocktail ice for local bars and restaurants. Using a directional freezer (it freezes from the bottom up), an engine hoist, ice picks and saw, Bonds makes truly pristine ice. As it freezes, the gas is able to escape through the top of the unit, as opposed to in a normal freezing scenario where it freezes from all sides, trapping gas as it does.

Once frozen, the 350 block has to temper f irst (as do cubes when used in drinks), before he can cut it. Tempering ice allows the temperature of a block to rise so that it won’t fracture when it comes in contact with a warmer drink or tool. Bonds bemoans a time he put a freshly pulled behemoth on his work table and watched (and heard) the block splinter.

“It was beautiful, but also heartbreaking,” he says.

Once tempered, the ice is cut into 2-inch cubes for rocks glasses or spears for the taller Collins glass (although he does craft custom dimensions for some local talent). They are elegant, but also far more utilitarian in drink making than regular old ice cubes.

“If you’re drinking a $100 bottle of scotch, you don’t want to ruin that experience,” says Bonds.

A larger cube of ice melts slower, chilling the drink without watering down the spirit. And with great-tasting water like Junction’s, melting isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Many flavor compounds in spirits are “trapped” by the high proof alcohol, so a little bit of water and minerals can help unlock flavors that were latent in the spirit (Bonds filters out only the solids, leaving the mineral profile in tact).

While Bonds’ Clinebell ice machine (a company born in Loveland, Colorado) can crank out about 2,400 square 2-inch cubes a week, his volume is still on the craft level. As such, when Bonds qualified for the incubator program at the Grand Junction Business Incubator, it was absolutely ideal.

“$2,500 a month, 8,000 square feet — I don’t need anything on that scale,” says Bonds. His space, a 588-square-foot workshop located at the Business Incubator campus, is tailor-made for something of his production size. The Incubator further has facilitated his company’s birth, offering classes on finance and bookkeeping. Bonds also qualified for the Grand Junction Economic Partnership’s Rural Jumpstart grant, furthering cementing his ability to make inroads on a commercial vacuum for the region.

“There’s no one doing this on this side of the Rockies,” he says. “And it’s prohibitive for bars and restaurants to do it themselves.” The homemade process is laborious, and a pain for freezer space. And so, Bonds already has loyal customers throughout Grand Junction.

The loyalty is well deserved. The cubes (and the titan that birthed them) are beautiful, and that’s the point.

“As a chef, a bartender, you want people to take pictures,” says Bonds. Photos allow those separated by distance to get a glimpse of an experience. Clear ice doesn’t muddy the water, it becomes a focal point unto itself. Crystallic, it draws the eye, and allows the drink around it to shine with the utmost clarity.

Originally published in the Winter 2024-25 issue of Spoke+Blossom.

Crystal Clear: Grand Valley Ice Makes High Quality Cocktail Ice for Bars + Restaurants