Online Moorcroft Monkeys Carousel Vase 121/14 – Numbered Moorcroft

Moorcroft Monkeys Carousel Vase

2024 A Grand Day Out Collection

Designer: Kerry Goodwin

Numbered Edition

Shape: 121/14 

Dimensions: H 35 x W 13.5 x D 13.5cm

A Grand Day Out sees a nostalgic collection of four retro carnival animal designs: elephants parade trunk-to-trunk; seals twist and turn, balancing balls on their noses under the watchful eye of the greatest showman; monkeys swing in wild abandonment on party balloons and pandas frolic playfully. The carnival of animals join a monochrome carousel with each design in the round forming what is one of the most extraordinary collections in recent years.

At the height of the Golden Age of Carousels (1890s-1920s), somewhere between 2,000 and 3,000 hand-carved, hand-painted merry-go-rounds were spinning around the United States. A Grand Day Out sees a curious group of much loved, star-spangled carnival animals brought to life in the style of Gustav Dentzel, known as “Hobby Horse” Bill, who pioneered the modern carousel in America in the 1860s.

Dentzel’s animals and horses have been described as confident, dignified, graceful and even regal, but there is an underlying gentleness about them. And so it is with this collection from a designer well known for creating a menagerie of humorous animal characters during her long Moorcroft design career.