AUSTIN (KXAN) — A giant troll will soon be lurking around a popular downtown Austin park.
The estimated 18-foot-tall and 15-foot-wide troll, designed by Danish artist Thomas Dambo, will be installed in Pease Park after the City of Austin approved it.
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The Pease Park Conservancy, a nonprofit that works with the City to maintain the park along Lamar Boulevard, initiated the concept last year.
Dambo uses recycled materials to build troll sculptures around the world. Dambo visited Austin in 2023 to explain his vision. Dambo’s team will arrive in Austin in February to initiate the build, the release said.
The Pease Park Conservancy estimates the troll should be complete in mid-March, according to its website. Dambo granted a 15-year exclusive license to the Pease Park artwork, “subject to the Conservancy maintaining the sculpture over this period,” the conservancy said.
Most of the material for the troll will come from a water tower at the J.J. Pickle Research Campus of the University of Texas at Austin. Harvest Lumber, a sawmill that gives new life to Austin’s fallen trees, milled the material, the release said.