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The Clown
A traditional-style duck with a bright red nose, painted makeup, and a colourful ruffled collar. Fun novelty duck for circus fans.
Specifications
| Material | Vinyl (PVC) body, painted face detail, fabric ruffled collar |
|---|---|
| Dimensions | 3.6 x 3.4 x 3.8 in (collar included) |
| Weight | 2.3 oz |
| Color | Yellow body, red nose, multicolor painted face and collar |
| Age Grade | 3+ years |
| Origin | Designed on Vashon Island, WA · Assembled overseas |
| Care Instructions | Wipe clean. Collar is fixed fabric, spot clean only, do not machine wash. |
The Full Story
The Clown is, by a wide margin, the design that generates the most polarized customer mail of anything in the catalog, a fact the customer service team has grown almost fond of over the years, in the way you grow fond of a recurring, mostly harmless storm. For every letter praising the cheerful colors and playful face paint, there is, reliably, another expressing what can only be described as deep, personal discomfort, occasionally including the word "phobia" written in genuinely distressed handwriting.
The design team has, more than once, discussed retiring it, and more than once decided against it, largely because sales figures consistently show it as one of the more requested designs for children's party favor bulk orders, a niche where its polarizing quality apparently matters less than its immediate recognizability as, simply, "the fun clown one."
The face paint pattern was based loosely on classic circus clown styling from early 20th century performance photography the design team pulled for reference, deliberately avoiding any more specific or unsettling modern horror-clown styling that was, at the time of design, having something of a cultural moment the team wanted no part of.
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Customer Reviews
Bright, cheerful, well made. Exactly what I expected from the photos.
The face paint detail is really crisp and the ruffled collar adds a lot of charm. Lovely piece.
Perfect fit for the theme, big hit with the guests.
I don't know what I expected buying a clown themed rubber duck but I did not expect to feel genuinely uneasy putting it on my bathroom shelf. Returned it after two days. Not the product's fault exactly, more a me problem, but I know I'm not alone on this given the history section basically confirms it.
She specifically requests 'clown duck bath time' now over any other duck we own, and we own a genuinely embarrassing number of these at this point.
One eye's makeup detail is very slightly higher than the other on mine, probably a minor hand-painting inconsistency, not enough to return over but worth mentioning for quality control.