Glide-snow avalanches involve significant volumes of moving snow and present a major challenge to infrastructure in snow-covered mountain regions. Their initiation consists of a sequence of processes that remains poorly understood. It is conceptualized as starting with a loss of friction along the snow-ground interface due to the presence of liquid water. To shed more light on the effect of liquid water at the snow-ground interface on friction, we tested snow samples on a temperature-controlled substratum in a cold laboratory for different conditions of roughness and snow liquid water content (LWC). We performed 51 interface shear tests, analyzed the stress-displacement behavior, and studied the effect of interfacial water on the friction angles (static and kinetic). A sort of stick-slip behavior was observed on lubricated glass. On a dry and rough surface, the snow failed across the sample and no sliding occurred at the interface. Under dry conditions on a smooth surface or lubricated conditions on a rough surface, a strain-softening behavior with an interfacial strength was observed. For the tests where the frictional strength was exceeded, the friction angle, both static and kinetic, showed no dependence on the liquid water content. In the future, we plan to refine and extend the experimental setup to investigate snow compaction and analyze the effect of snowpack properties on gliding behavior.