---
title: "Buda, Texas unveils a 19-foot steel wiener dog ahead of its dachshund races’ 30th year"
url: https://badiyaa.com/buda-texas-steel-wiener-dog-sculpture/
published: 2026-10-15T04:00:00+01:00
modified: 2026-10-15T04:00:00+01:00
section: Pets & Animals
publisher: Badiyaa
---

# Buda, Texas unveils a 19-foot steel wiener dog ahead of its dachshund races’ 30th year

City records show a deal of up to $139,500 for the Cor-Ten dachshund, built from more than 400 steel parts and now standing in Buda City Park.

Buda, a Central Texas city on the Interstate 35 corridor, now has a dachshund you cannot miss: a steel sculpture 19 feet long, 10 feet tall and 5 feet wide, unveiled in Buda City Park on Saturday, October 10. The town’s economic development corporation calls it the largest wiener dog in Texas, and it went up six months before the town’s dachshund races reach their 30th anniversary in April 2027.

The dog is posed mid-sprint. Jennifer Storm, chief executive of the Buda Economic Development Corporation (Buda EDC), said she wanted it to look like a racer, “with her ears flying back, her legs moving, and that determined look that anyone who has watched the annual races knows so well.” Austin-based fabricator Art Seen Alliance designed and built it from more than 400 separate pieces of Cor-Ten, a weathering steel that rusts on the surface to form a protective brown coat, so the dog will darken over the coming years.

## What the dog cost

The city’s own paperwork gives the price ceiling. Buda City Council’s agenda for March 24, 2026 listed a “promotional agreement with Art Seen Alliance in an amount not to exceed” $139,500, plus a related budget amendment, “for installation at Buda City Park,” brought by the EDC. The agreement was also scheduled for closed-door discussion under the economic development section of Texas open-meetings law before any public vote. The EDC says the project went ahead with the backing of its board and the City Council.

Some rough arithmetic puts that ceiling in proportion. At the full $139,500, the sculpture works out to about $7,340 per foot of dog ($139,500 divided by 19 feet), or roughly $349 for each of its 400-plus steel parts. Those are upper limits, since the agenda sets a maximum rather than a final invoice, and the final figure has not been published.

The EDC is open that this is marketing as much as art. It sees the sculpture as a reason for drivers on I-35 to pull off, take a photo and spend money in town. “This pup isn’t merely decoration. It’s an investment in our identity,” Storm said in the corporation’s announcement, which marked its own 25th anniversary. She has said the idea came to her on a family drive to see Minnesota’s largest ball of twine: if people would travel hours for twine, she reasoned, a giant dachshund might work for Buda. Getting the design right took a little over a year.

## Three decades of racing dachshunds

The sculpture honors a fundraiser that outgrew its town. The Buda Wiener Dog Races began in 1997 to raise money for the Buda Lions Club, and they earned Buda its nickname, the “Wiener Dog Capital of Texas.” Today thousands of spectators turn out to watch more than 300 dachshunds and dachshund mixes known as chiweenies race and compete in costume contests.

The event has even reached the state record. In May 2017 the Texas House of Representatives adopted [House Resolution 1554](https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/85R/billtext/html/HR01554F.htm) to mark that year’s 20th annual Buda Country Fair and Wiener Dog Races, held April 29-30 with the theme “WienerTopia.” The resolution notes that all race proceeds go to the Lions Club, which helps children with vision impairments and other people with disabilities and funds scholarships for local college students. That weekend built up to a final showdown billed as the Run for the Roses.

The races are still a city fixture. On the same March 2026 agenda, the council was asked to waive the park rental fee for the Lions Club races on April 25-26, 2026, at the same City Park that now holds the steel dog.

## Seeing it

The sculpture stands in Buda City Park at 204 San Antonio Street. Expect its color to shift as the steel’s patina deepens toward brown. Sally Lindsay, director of Art Seen Alliance, said the studio hopes the piece “delights for many years to come.” The next chance to see real dachshunds sprint past it comes in April 2027, at the 30th-anniversary races.

## Further reading

- [Texas House Resolution 1554 (2017): Buda Country Fair and Wiener Dog Races](https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/85R/billtext/html/HR01554F.htm)

*Image: Larry D. Moore, CC BY 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons*

*This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by our Editorial Desk. [How we work](/editorial-policy/).*