Featherstone Flamingos: The Iconic Pink Lawn Ornament

A classic for the vintage outdoor space!

Featherstone Flamingos are a classic lawn ornament that has been popular for decades. These pink plastic birds can be seen in yards across the country, adding a touch of whimsy to any outdoor space. In this blog post, we’ll explore the history of Featherstone Flamingos and share some tips for incorporating them into your own lawn decor. History of Featherstone Flamingos Don Featherstone, a…

View On WordPress

Dude I watched gnomeo and Juliet last night for the first time in like five years and LET ME FUCKING TELL YOU:

The jokes are fucking amazing “I’m not illiterate, my parents were married” ABSOLUTELY PISSING MYSELF, “I may not be a smart bird, but I know what love is” FUCKING DEVASTATING,

WHY DOES NO ONE TALK ABOUT THIS MOVIE???

The owners of Featherstone’s old home is Miss Montague and Mr Capulet. Because I say so

Don Featherstone, inventor of the garden flamingo 🦩✨

*ahem* what are ur thoughts on gnomeo and juliet?

I unironically think gnomeo and Juliet is one of the greatest movies of all time— definitely my favorite adaptation of Romeo and Juliet ever.

I know the whole thing of the original story is that it’s more of a tragedy because they were very young children, but I think that having them both be adults on the verge of being the leaders of their family makes it compelling and powerful.

Like the way juliet is treated like a decoration by her father. She’s literally a decoration of course, but the other gnomes aren’t treated like that. Like she’s fragile, like she’s not capable. And that’s what gnomeo loves about her most. The fact that she is strong and capable.

They met in a space where they could step out of the preconceived notions of what they are— in a true neutral ground. (With Featherstone!! Named after Don Featherstone, the original creator of the pink flamingo lawn ornament!!!!) because of that, they never had the CHANCE to see the other for the flaws their family has centered.

It’s so meaningful to me. Gnomeo has malewife swag.

The sequel is even better. Sherlock and Watson are the most divorced sherlock and Watson I’ve seen since house and Wilson from house MD. Mary j Blige does the best musical number ever as a whole ass ball jointed doll. It’s magical. It’s beautiful.

what pokemon is this

that plastic flamingo from gnomeo and juliet. featherstone i think

Gnomeo & Juliet hug headcanons

Gnomeo

Isn’t really a hugger. If someone he doesn’t know very well tries to hug him he’ll probably just stand there awkwardly until they pull away

bUT when he does hug, he pours every ounce of his love and care into it.

Very tight hugs usually. Allows the person to rest their head on his chest as he holds them close. Will maybe lay his head on theirs and give them a squeeze

When hugging Juliet he always gives her a kiss on the head. It’s a requirement.

Juliet

Secretly loves hugs, but isn’t great at showing it since she was denied affection for most of her life

Gentle hugs with an occasional squeeze. Will either wrap her arms around the person’s neck or around their back, depending on the person.

Feels most comfortable when hugging Gnomeo, it’s when she fully gives into the hug and just buries herself into his embrace. Might sway with him too if it’s a longer hug

Featherstone

You can hug this guy at any given point and he will not hesitate to hug back

Obviously he doesn’t have arms, so he’ll wrap his leg around the person extra tight around the waist or back (depends on how tall they are)

When it comes to hugging his wife (another flamingo) he nuzzles his head against hers, maybe hugs her by draping his neck over hers

Benny

Is a little awkward when it comes to hugs. Gotta get used to the person first

Since he’s so short he usually just hugs the person’s legs, unless they crouch down. In which case he gets on his toes and rests his arms on their sides

Nanette

A big hugger definitely. She hugs when she gets excited or overjoyed, but also to provide comfort when needed

Very tight hugs. She might shake the person or jump and down with them if she’s excited.

Gives the occasional side hug when it’s a casual situation. Might pat them on the shoulder and squeeze their arm.

Shroom

Doesn’t have long enough arms, so he hugs by nuzzling against someone’s leg, and it’s the most comforting thing they’ll ever experience

When he’s being hugged first, he nudges his head against their chest or arm to reciprocate

Tybalt

Not a hugger at all. If anyone tries to hug him they’ll either be pushed away or he’ll just step back before they can even put their arms around them

However when Fawn or the goons hug him, he just stands there and waits impatiently for them to pull away

Lady Bluebury

Really only hugs her family or people she considers family.

Gentle hugs usually. She may rest her arms over someone’s shoulders from behind. She’s also more likely to pull them in closer and let them rest their head on her shoulder. Might pet their head if they’ll allow it

Lord Redbrick

Doesn’t find hugs very comfortable, so he rarely shows that type of affection.

When he does hug, it might be kinda stiff and awkward at first. He just hovers his arms over the person, waiting for it to be over.

However if he’s gotten close with said person, he will allow them to hug him on occasion. He simply rests his hands on their back and pays their shoulder

Fawn

Surprisingly very affectionate when it comes to hugs.

He gets on his hind legs just to hug the person and rubs his hoof over their back. It might not last long, but he enjoys every second of it.

Paris

Not a big fan of hugs, but depending on the person he’ll accept it without doing much to reciprocate.

Side hugs are his go-to. Will squeeze the person’s shoulder then quickly pull away.

@omni-scient-pan-da

The plastic pink lawn flamingo was invented in 1957 by a guy named Don Featherstone who I guess just really loved flamingos. The original plastic flamingo was named Diego :)

The flamingo is now an icon of American pop culture, and fun fact: there are actually imposter flamingos out there. Genuine plastic pink flamingos made by Featherstone’s company had his signature on them until his retirement in 2000. So nowadays it’s kinda hard to tell 🤷🏼‍♀️

They’re usually sold in pairs, with one standing upright and the other with its neck and beak bend to the ground as if it’s feeding

Bonus fun fact: I *love* plastic pink flamingos which is why I know all this and I always wanted some, so when I graduated high school in 2017, my parents bought some and we used them as a yard game at my graduation open house. We had them set out a certain distance apart from each other and we had plastic rings which you would throw and try to land them around the flamingos’ necks

Don Featherstone, father of the plastic flamingo.

Why?

Who made the original Pink Flamingos?

Donald Featherstone was the American creator best known for his 1957 creation of the plastic pink flamingo while working for Union Products. The name of the first pink flamingo was Diego and it has become a pop culture icon that earned him the Ig Nobel Prize for Art in 1996.

The artist based his creation on National Geographic photographs of flamingos, as he was unable to obtain real flamingos to use as models. As time passed, the plastic flamingo became more popular. They appeared throughout the country and even as part of various art exhibits. In 1987, Donald Featherstone inscribed his signature on the original plastic mold. Apparently, this was to help distinguish between the original pink plastic flamingos and the "knockoffs". 

Pink flamingo

Pink flamingo movie#

Having been condemned in the press as “the filthiest person alive”, Divine has adopted the alias Babs Johnson, and fled to a derelict mobile home in the woods with her hillbilly son (Danny Mills), her son’s voyeuristic girlfriend (Mary Vivian Pearce), and her mother (Edith Massey), who is described by Waters in Shock Value as “a 250-pound senior citizen who sits in a playpen dressed in a girdle and bra and worships eggs”. Harris Glenn Milstead, better known by the stage name Divine, stars as a woman who is also called Divine, a vision in a tight sparkly dress, with a back-combed coiffure, and iconic eye make-up that reaches all the way up her forehead. “I would’ve loved to have had my picture taken with him under our big pink flamingo,” Café Hon owner Denise Whiting says of Featherstone.īut best of all, even as the country mourns the loss of the inventor (on Wednesday, Featherstone graced the cover of The New York Time s), his creative legacy lives on-those plastic feathered friends forever emblazoned in American memory as a symbol of novelty, and still stuck, neck arched and one-legged, into the Baltimore grass.The plot, says the BBFC’s website with exquisite understatement, “is unusual but fairly straightforward”. There are flamingos tucked into every corner of the neighborhood’s annual HonFest, on the treetops of 34th Street during the holidays, and, of course, in Cafe Hon, first opened in 1992, with its flamingo chandeliers, cocktails, and prodigious façade (which caused the Flamingogate of 2009). Up near The Avenue, pink flamingo populations are still alive and well. I think when it was innocent, it was much more touching and influential.” But then it went on to become: yuppies have it on their lawn! That’s when I gave all mine away. “And at the time, pink flamingos subtly questioned taste.

Pink flamingo movie#

“But it was always going to be called Pink Flamingos because it was a very calm title for a movie that was the opposite,” he says. Demented, and The Wire, found them for the film, along with other set pieces like a plate that read “God Bless Our Mobile Home.” Waters notes that Pink Flamingos production designer Vincent Peranio, who went on to do Homicide, Cecil B. (As does Madison, Wisconsin, whose council named the plastic pink flamingo their official city bird.) Through bouts of popularity all across the country, the pink flamingo has remained bound to our city, at one point or another designating Hampden as its unofficial urban district, which proudly wears the honor. Later, became like the hula-hoop, they became a huge fad, but they’ve gone through many, many changes over the years.” “When we made Pink Flamingos in the fall of ’71, nobody collected ’50s stuff-it was before ‘modern-antiques’ was even a term-and thrift shops were filled with it.Įverybody was collecting ’30s and ’40s stuff-even hippiesĭressed like they were the gold diggers of ’33-but nobody wanted to “I liked because the ’50s had not been revived yet,” says Waters. Just as Waters’ film was banned in theaters, some neighborhood associations started to ban the eyesores in their communities. Hippies opposed the use of plastic, and what had once been a symbol of taste quickly devolved into a tchotchke of tackiness. From California to Charm City, families welcomed the bright, beloved bird into their yards.īy the 1960s and ’70s, however, the flamingo’s mainstream popularity waned. With a burgeoning consumer society came the embrace of plastic and mass production, and hence, Featherstone’s tour de force. Same, but front lawns were a way to keep up with the Joneses and also standĪpart. All across the country, houses looked the II America was in a state of suburban sprawl, with baby-boom desire driving development of nuclear dream homes. One of his first assignments was to create the neon, umbrella-shaped bird, which debuted in 1957, and was soon immortalized in American culture. He attended art school there, honing his craft as a sculptor, before ultimately landing a job at a large manufacturer of lawn and garden decorations. Fittingly surnamed, Featherstone was not a Baltimore native but rather from Massachusetts. On Monday, the plastic bird’s inventor, Don Featherstone, passed away at the age of 79, nearly 60 years after his famed flamingo first came off the assembly line. “That may have been the beginning of my obsession with them, because whatever I was told I wasn’t supposed to like, I always did.” “When I grew up, I think my mother, who was great at the tyranny of good taste, mentioned her disdain for lawn ornaments, especially pink flamingos,” Waters says. Over the years, the mid-century lawn ornament has cemented itself in our city’s narrative, largely thanks to our own auteur John Waters and his 1972 film Pink Flamingos. And, of course, we have the pink flamingo.

Flamingo Yard Art

Since the 1950s, flamingos have been popular lawn decorations. In 1957, Donald Feathers began marketing plastic flamingos as garden decorations. The popularity of these colorful birds spread throughout the country, and they were considered a symbol of Americana culture. Today, flamingo yard art is available in many forms and sizes. In 1957, Don Featherstone created the iconic pink flamingo lawn…

View On WordPress

How the pink plastic lawn flamingo became an American cultural icon - Vox Future Look of Retro https://www.vox.com/2015/6/24/8836043/plastic-pink-flamingo-history-featherstone

Real talk guys the pink flamingo from gnomeo and Juliet should be reunited with his original wife and not a replacement. Justice for featherstone. Fuck.

Free matching icons