It's probably not a coincidence that my next collection spotlight is another Karen Gerhardt sculpt. The two sculpts she's done for Breyer (the Cleveland Bay and the Shire Gelding) are two of my favorite sculpts in the Traditional lineup. They have the softest, sweetest faces, and they have wonderful ABCs. Several of them are in my show string rotation, and I think a decent amount of them have at least one NAN card.
I was lucky enough to receive my Cardinal directly from Breyer - while I was not drawn for him, my friend was and she kindly offered him to me at cost. Hooray for plastic pony friends!
Cardinal was produced in 2022 as a Collector Club Web Special. He was offered to club members through a lottery drawing. Designed by Sommer Prosser as part of the Birds of a Feather series, he's done in a lovely shaded chestnut sabino.
Cardinal is a run of 500. At the time, he represented a jump in the Web Special numbers - the Birds of a Feather releases from 2021 were all runs from 375-380. This numbers have continued to rise since then. The 2025 Exotic Destinations series are all runs of 600. I don't foresee this changing as the hobby continues to grow, unless the tariffs and inflation hit Breyer especially hard.
Fun fact: Cardinal's show name is Birdhorse. Extra fun fact: My Peregrine's name is 2 Bird 2 Horse because I went with the Fast and Furious naming conventions for these two. They were also both drawn by the same friend. Flamingo is my final horse of the series, and I was drawn for her myself. Ironically, the last Web Special I was personally drawn for before Flamingo was Sanibel, another gray Arabian!
The Birds of a Feather series is a lovely, well-designed set. At some point I'd like to pick up a Crane and an Oriole, but they aren't currently priorities for me.
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