Duncan Ceramic Master Studio "Peggy in April" Hand-Painted Figurine, Girl with a Flower Basket, Moulded and Copyright-Dated 1949, Fresno, California
Viridian Eclection
The Piece A hand-painted ceramic figurine of a girl in a lilac-pink dress, carrying a basket of flowers and gathering her apron in one hand. The modelling is soft and rounded, the glaze is a wa...
The Piece
A hand-painted ceramic figurine of a girl in a lilac-pink dress, carrying a basket of flowers and gathering her apron in one hand.
The modelling is soft and rounded, the glaze is a warm cream, and everything on the face is brushwork — the black hair, the drawn lashes and brows, the red mouth, the blue flower tucked above one ear. The dress is washed in lilac with deeper rose in the folds, and the basket is picked out flower by flower.
The base carries the whole identification, moulded into the clay rather than printed on it: Duncan Ceramic Master Studio, the oval studio device, ©49, and the model name PEGGY in APRIL.
History & Provenance
The copyright year is in the clay, so the date needs no argument: 1949.
Duncan is a California pottery with a real history, and most people know only half of it. Erma Duncan began teaching ceramics out of her own home while still in her teens. The family operation outgrew the garage and opened the first Duncan Ceramic Studio on Blackstone Avenue in Fresno in 1946 — Erma running art and instruction, her son Bob on sales, her son Dick on design and manufacturing.
1949 is a specific year in that story. It is the year Dick Duncan formulated the first non-settling glaze in the ceramics industry — the technical breakthrough that turned a family studio into a company. Duncan incorporated in 1955 and became Duncan Enterprises in 1975.
And that is why this figurine is a different object from what the Duncan name usually means. Almost everyone who knows Duncan knows it as the mould-and-glaze supplier that armed the American hobby-ceramics trade for half a century. A finished, named, copyright-dated figurine from the studio’s own early production belongs to a much smaller and much earlier body of work — made in the years when Duncan was still a studio making things rather than a company supplying others to make them.
Peggy is April in a calendar series. A 1949 Duncan figurine named May — Larae is documented, and other 1949 Duncan “Peggy” figurines have traded. Each month took a girl’s name.
Product Details
| Object | Hand-painted ceramic figurine, girl with a flower basket |
| Model | “Peggy in April” — April in a named month series |
| Maker | Duncan Ceramic Master Studio, Fresno, California |
| Dimensions | Approximately 6½ in tall |
| Decoration | Hand-painted throughout — black hair, drawn lashes and brows, red mouth, blue hair flower, lilac and rose dress, individually picked-out basket flowers |
| Marks | Moulded into the base: Duncan Ceramic Master Studio, oval studio device, ©49, PEGGY in APRIL |
| Era | 1949, from the copyright year moulded into the base. No estimate involved. |
| Condition | Good. The figurine is sound and stands level, the modelling is crisp, and the hand-painted decoration is bright and unrubbed with the face fully intact. There is fine crazing throughout the glaze — a network of hairlines across the face, neck and basket — which is the normal behaviour of a seventy-five-year-old glaze and not a fault in a display object. There is a small chip to the edge of the base, showing white body, low down and not visible from the front. No cracks, no repairs and no restoration. Condition Guaranteed. |
| Availability | One of a Kind — 1 Available |
Why It Belongs in Your Home
A dated object is worth more than a pretty one, and this is both.
Most decorative ceramics are dated by somebody’s judgment — a style, a glaze, a guess. This one has 1949 moulded into it by the people who made it, along with their name and the name they gave her. In a cabinet of objects whose ages are all estimates, that is quietly authoritative.
It also belongs to a specific and collectable moment: post-war California pottery, the same years and the same state that produced Florence Ceramics, Hedi Schoop, Brayton Laguna and Kay Finch. Duncan sits alongside them and is far better documented than most.
At six and a half inches she goes on a shelf, a mantel, a windowsill or inside a cabinet without crowding anything, and the lilac-and-cream palette is easy against wood, white paint and old books.
And there are eleven more months out there. If you like her, she is the start of something findable — a calendar series is the best kind of collection because it has a natural end.
A note on care. Dust with a soft dry brush, not a cloth. A cloth catches on the basket and the hair and takes paint with it.
Never wash it. Crazing means the glaze is no longer a sealed surface: water travels into the hairlines, carries dirt with it, and stains the body from the inside permanently. That damage cannot be reversed.
Keep her out of direct sun, which yellows a crazed glaze faster than an intact one, and off a windowsill that gets condensation.
Every piece is packed with professional-grade materials: multiple foam layers, double-boxing, directional and fragile handling labels. For large furniture we use custom timber crating. We photograph packing before dispatch and can provide images on request.
White-glove delivery is complimentary within 100 miles of Reno, NV. National shipping quotes provided at checkout. All shipments are photographed and documented. Damage claims must be filed with the carrier; we provide all documentation needed to support your claim.
Local pickup is available at Viridian HQ (Reno, NV) with 2–4 days notice. Contact us to arrange. Private viewings also available.
All antique and vintage items are sold as described and all sales are final. Each listing includes detailed condition notes and photographs so you can make a fully informed decision. We encourage buyers to ask questions — about condition, dimensions, finish, provenance — before purchasing.
Antiques are irreplaceable and one-of-a-kind. Carrier handling is outside our control once a piece has left our facility, and major carriers including FedEx do not insure antiques. We do everything within our power to ensure safe transit, but cannot accept liability for carrier damage. If damage occurs in transit, we will provide full documentation to support your carrier claim.
Have a question? — we're happy to provide additional photos, condition detail, or discuss the piece directly.
