Donald Featherstone

Donald Featherstone (January 25, 1936 – June 22, 2015) was an American artist most widely known for his 1957 creation of the plastic pink flamingo while working for Union Products. Featherstone resided in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, and grew up in nearby Berlin. After graduating from the Worcester Art Museum's art school, in 1957, he was offered a job designing three-dimensional animals for Union Products, Inc. Over his years at Union Products, Featherstone sculpted over 750 different items, the first two of which were a girl with a water can and a boy with a dog.

In 1996, Featherstone was awarded the 1996 Ig Nobel Art Prize for his creation of the pink flamingo,

On June 22, 2015, Featherstone died from Lewy body dementia at the age of 79. Visitors often leave pink flamingos of their own on the lawn around his grave.

Pink flamingo

Featherstone based his creation on photographs of flamingos from National Geographic, This was apparently to help distinguish between original and "knock-off" pink plastic flamingos. In 2010, Cado Products purchased the copyrights and plastic molds for the pink flamingos and continues to manufacture them. They are generally sold in sets of two—one holding its head erect, nearly high, the other bending over as if looking for food.