This month scores of worms will descend on Sacramento, but have no fear these cute little creatures might just be your new best friend … if you can find them.
Wormie World, the beloved city-wide scavenger hunt is back for its third year Saturday, October 17th.
A dedicated team of two lovingly crafts hundreds of ceramic worms and hides them throughout the city of trees.
Humble beginnings
Brittany Clark came up with the idea in 2024 after she participated in the global scavenger hunt called “Game of Shrooms.”
“I was very inspired and I happened to love earthworms. I’ve always saved them when it rains,” Clark said in an interview with Vicki Gonzalez on Insight. “I thought the merging of the two would be really fun, and I felt like Sacramento needed a goofy, whimsical, fun thing that we could do every year.”
So she put her burgeoning ceramic skills to use, making over 100 worms at her kitchen table and hiding them throughout the Sacramento city center.
In her initial post announcing the first Wormie World, Clark writes, “This free event was created to help spread joy and to share in our appreciation for worms.”
The event went over like gangbusters and pretty quickly word started spreading.
Pumpkin Worm hiding out in the CapRadio garden area.Chris Felts/CapRadio
Recruiting more worm lovers
One of the participants on that first day in 2024 was muralist Karen Sue Chen.
“I had like literally the best day ever looking for worms,” Chen says. “I’m an artist by profession so when I saw all these ceramic worms, I knew there was a lot of love poured into it.”
She enjoyed getting a chance to explore Sacramento through such a unique lens. So much so, she started messaging Clark on Instagram, becoming good friends and offering her services to craft the next batch of worms. She ended up crafting 250 of them for the 2025 scavenger hunt. They estimate each one takes about an hour to make, from sculpting to glazinging to firing in a kiln.
The popularity of the event has grown so much that Clark and Chen have made over 700 worms for 2026.
“I never would have imagined that [it] would have grown to this scale,” Clark said thinking back to the first hunt in 2024. “I had told my husband the first week of Wormie World, that I truly thought no one would come to find them.”
Worms about town
If you want one of these cute little creatures for yourself (which I know you do) the scavenger hunt will start on Saturday the 17th. Video hints for each worm’s location will be posted on the Wormie World Instagram and TikTok starting at 8 a.m.
They’ll be hidden throughout Midtown, Downtown, and the surrounding neighborhoods. Clark and Chen say they look for hiding spots year round and love to highlight cool places in the city, especially murals and art. All of the hiding places are public and don’t require any climbing to find your wormy treasure.
This year will be their biggest event so far. In addition to the hundreds of worms hidden across the city, participants can also fill out a Wormie World passport. Twenty local businesses will be participating including the Sacramento Zoo and the Sacramento History Museum. In addition to having some worms hidden in their shops, each location will be stamping passports.
Clark and Chen can be found all day on Saturday at the Strapping Store in Oak Park. They’ll be selling merch, talking to fans, and giving out exclusive stickers to anyone who completes a passport.
Clark says she loves that people value her and Karen’s art and that so many people have resonated with Wormie Word over the years.
“There was a little girl who has social anxiety and her mom reached out and told us that she takes her worm to school with her every day and it helps her,” Clark said. “And so I just cried when I read [it], I just never would have expected that.”
Scuba Worm out in the CapRadio garden.Chris Felts/CapRadio
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