Note: Authored by David Menconi, this piece has been produced in partnership with Raleigh Arts. Menconi's latest book, "Oh, Didn't They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music," was published in the fall of 2023 by University of North Carolina Press. His podcast, Carolina Calling, explores the history of the Tar Heel State through music.

When the call went out for volunteers to help with the Dorothea Dix Park troll project, Dix Conservancy anticipated an enthusiastic response. But they were still unprepared for just how many people would want to help build out and install five of internationally renowned artist Thomas Dambo’s troll sculptures in the park.

“You would’ve thought we were selling Taylor Swift tickets,” says Anna-Golden Torres, Dix Coservancy’s senior communications and marketing manager, with a laugh. “When the clock struck noon on the day of volunteer registration, so many people logged on that it crashed the system.”

Eventually, about 400 volunteers were able to sign up for the Dambo troll project, which has been in the works since conversations about it began in 2023. Working with a dozen members of Dambo’s team from Denmark, they logged 2,200 volunteer hours. Along the way, the project consumed an estimated 24 tons of reclaimed wood and 50,000 nails—as well as 40 pots of coffee and 204 gallons of water.

The resulting five sculptures are scattered across Dix Park, 10 feet and taller in height, and they are magnificent. Of particular note is “Mother Strong Tail,” which has a 645-foot-long tail snaking through the pine grove by Dix’s Flowers Field. The tail is made of barrel staves repurposed from barrels provided by the Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Company.

“We had 17 tons of bourbon barrels, which had to be broken down and reassembled into half-barrels,” says Torres. “By the end of the day, people looked like they’d been in a coal mine, just covered in soot. It was hard work, a lot harder than some of our volunteers were expecting.”

Born in 1979, Dambo’s initial artistic life was as a hip-hop artist with the Danish collective Fler Farver. He also attended design school, gravitating over time toward visual arts as a sculptor whose work “celebrates the intersection of art, nature, storytelling and recycling.”

Trolls are the subject of much lore in Dambo’s native land, and in 2014 he launched a long-running artistic project called “Trail of a Thousand Trolls,” creating sculptures out of repurposed wood and pallets plus fallen tree branches. Thus far, he has installed more than 150 across five continents, each accompanied by storylines crafted by the artist (and rendered in hip-hop verse). Dambo estimates than more than 4.5 million people travel using the Troll Map to discover them each year.

Privately funded through donations, the Dix Park troll project is a partnership between Dix Conservancy, Habitat for Humanity, Raleigh Reclaimed and the City of Raleigh. The sculptures should have about a 10-year lifespan, although the partnership hopes to extend that with judicious maintenance.

Within Dix Park, two of the sculptures stand near the dog park, two by the cemetery and one near Gipson Play Plaza. The five Raleigh trolls are part of a set of seven that includes two additional “teen sibling” troll sculptures in Charlotte and High Point. Collectively, all seven make up “The Grandmother Tree.” As conceived by Dambo, it’s a story about the parent of all the trees in the forest, which the seven trolls are tasked with protecting.

[Find a map—plus meet the trolls—on this page.]

“The Grandmother Tree is the oldest and biggest of all the trees in the forest, so it’s in danger of being cut down for lumber,” says Torres. “In order to protect her, the trolls have shrunken and hidden her. All seven trolls have a necklace with a symbol. Once you find them all, you can enter them in the troll map and it gives you a hint about where the Grandmother Tree is.”

After three weeks of assembly during October 2025, the trolls made their debut at the end of the month. Dix is offering “Troll Treks” with tours and workshops on Saturdays through November, except for Thanksgiving weekend.

“This is a really awesome project not just for Dix Park but the whole state,” says Torres. “It’s been great to see its impact. The trolls have people using the whole park, walking to discover them, and it’s made Dix come alive. People are picnicking in the fields, taking pictures, walking around asking questions. That’s what we want.”

^{All photos courtesy of Dix Park Conservancy}