There is very little information to be had on Bernard Studios - Chipman’s Scrapbook only gives a single page with two instances from the pottery, while Lehner’s Marks does not list it at all. From the description, it appears that this was a Los Angeles pottery that specialized in animal figurines that are very much in line with those produced by DeLee, Rio Hondo and West Coast potteries. I have heard a rumor that Bernard Studios may have either meticulously copied or used the actual molds from other potteries in their designs - although there are quite a few figurines that are unique to the company as well.

There are two animal types that turn up the most with Bernard Studios and those are rabbits and deer. Nearly all of these figures tend to have hand painted faces, eyes and other details. They seem to be a little bit “rougher” in quality than some of the other well known California pottery manufacturers.

Although figurines are mostly what you see from them, the piece I found was actually a really nice “scroll” vase that is more in line with the work from Artistic Potteries or Knowles, Taylor Knowles. The mottled glaze in particular is very reminiscient of items those potteries made. This type of vase is actually one of the few non animal figures I’ve seen made by the pottery. The other exception was a salt and pepper shaker.

Many of the items are marked with ink stamps under the glaze as seen in the picture below. It consists of the words “Bernard Studios” inside of a circle with a small star in the middle. Some of the others were definitely also marked with foil paper labels that read variously: “Bernard Studios Mfgrs. of Ceramics Made In California” and “Bernard Studios Mfgrs. of Ceramics Made In Fullerton”. That last paper label is interesting because it places the pottery in an actual city - Fullerton, CA which is sort of near Anaheim in the OC. I’m not sure if this was the only address of the pottery, or if they had moved as many potteries in California did.

I have no idea on the dates the pottery operated, but from the look of the animal figurines and the vase that I have, I think their heyday was probably in the 40s sometime.

More Images:

Update 8/2008: We also found the funny looking rabbit shown above which is most likely a Bernard Studios piece.

Note: We've tried to provide as much info as possible on this pottery maker or artist. For further info, you may want to research the items they have on Ebay listed under this name. We've tried to hand tailor the searches below so they will bring up the most accurate results. If there are no results, it will list general California pottery.