Wrocław Dwarves

Address All over Wrocław

Over 800 small bronze dwarves are scattered across the streets, walls, fountains and shop windows of central Wrocław — leaning out of drainpipes, sleeping on benches, fishing for coins. Each one has a name and a small backstory. The city publishes maps; a walk hunting for a few dozen is a happy way to spend an afternoon with children, or, frankly, without them.

The first official dwarf, Papa Krasnal, sits on Świdnicka Street and dates from 2001. Look for the firefighters near the firehouse, the sleeping miner near the railway station, and the wheelchair-bound dwarves outside the city's main accessibility advocacy office.

things to do sight
A story
The dwarves trace back to the Orange Alternative, an anti-communist underground movement in Wrocław in the 1980s that painted dwarves over censored anti-government graffiti as a way to ridicule the regime. The first bronze sculpture (Papa Krasnal, or Father Dwarf) was unveiled in 2001 in homage to that history; the city has gone slightly mad with them ever since.