From 2001 through 2011, Breyer produced the Connoisseur series - fifty runs of 350 pieces each, featuring complex, highly-detailed paint jobs of a caliber not-yet-seen in original finish plastic and sold exclusively to subscribers of Breyer’s Just About Horses (JAH) magazine.
They were a smash hit.
Refinement of the new painting techniques used to create the Connoisseurs would lead to the introduction of the Breyer Premier Club in 2012, which offered Connoisseur-level paint jobs on brand new sculpts. Unlike the Connoisseurs, the Premier Club models aren’t limited to a finite quantity - anyone can sign up for the club each year. Early Premier Club memberships numbered around 750; Breyer hasn’t released membership numbers since 2014, but I’m sure they’re well into the thousands by now.
They were a smash hit.
Refinement of the new painting techniques used to create the Connoisseurs would lead to the introduction of the Breyer Premier Club in 2012, which offered Connoisseur-level paint jobs on brand new sculpts. Unlike the Connoisseurs, the Premier Club models aren’t limited to a finite quantity - anyone can sign up for the club each year. Early Premier Club memberships numbered around 750; Breyer hasn’t released membership numbers since 2014, but I’m sure they’re well into the thousands by now.
I digress.
I took a step back from the hobby after high school and thus didn’t know about the Connoisseurs until I resubscribed to Just About Horses in 2003. The first magazine I received, March/April 2003, had a picture of the horse who became the longest-standing and most intensely desired grail I’ve ever had. Most of the folks who read this blog already know who he is, but even though he was my first Connoisseur acquisition and I usually go in that order, I’m saving him for last, because he’s my favorite model in my collection. By a lot.
First up, my three others.
This is #90122 Hope-N-Glory, the tenth release in the Connoisseur series from the September/October 2002 JAH. She is #61/350. I’m a giant Lady Phase fan (she’s my second-biggest conga at 40 pieces) and it’s no wonder I’m in love with her paint job - it was designed by Tom Bainbridge, an artist whose work I’ve salivated over since I first saw a custom by him in the late 90s.
This Hope-N-Glory graces my shelves solely because of my friend Kelly W. It was the Saturday night of BreyerFest 2017. Kelly called me on my cell and told me to meet her in one of the CHIN rooms. When Kelly tells you to come see a Breyer, you go see the Breyer. When I got there, Kelly pointed to the Hope-N-Glory on the bed and said, “That’s a really good price.” It was a really good price - the cheapest I’d ever seen for her - but it was late Saturday night and I had already spent my plastic pony budget. I said that to Kelly; she said, “Well, then, I’m going to buy her for you because you need her, and you can just pay me back.” So she did, and I did, and that was that.
I show her regularly; her show name is Phrenology, an anagram of her issue name. She does okay, but there’s another Hope-N-Glory in my region whose mapping and coronet bands are a smidge cleaner and whose shading is a little nicer, so that one usually (and fairly) beats mine.
This Hope-N-Glory graces my shelves solely because of my friend Kelly W. It was the Saturday night of BreyerFest 2017. Kelly called me on my cell and told me to meet her in one of the CHIN rooms. When Kelly tells you to come see a Breyer, you go see the Breyer. When I got there, Kelly pointed to the Hope-N-Glory on the bed and said, “That’s a really good price.” It was a really good price - the cheapest I’d ever seen for her - but it was late Saturday night and I had already spent my plastic pony budget. I said that to Kelly; she said, “Well, then, I’m going to buy her for you because you need her, and you can just pay me back.” So she did, and I did, and that was that.
I show her regularly; her show name is Phrenology, an anagram of her issue name. She does okay, but there’s another Hope-N-Glory in my region whose mapping and coronet bands are a smidge cleaner and whose shading is a little nicer, so that one usually (and fairly) beats mine.
#90127 Del Fuego is the fifteenth release in the Connoisseur series, offered through the January/February 2004 issue of JAH. Mine is #329/350. I bought him through Model Horse Sales Pages in May of 2018. His price was lower than many because the seller didn’t have his COA. I would have liked the COA, but I wasn’t about to pass him up for that price.
His show name is Shango. He’s done fairly well in the show ring; of the nine shows he’s been to, he’s only been out of the ribbons twice.
His show name is Shango. He’s done fairly well in the show ring; of the nine shows he’s been to, he’s only been out of the ribbons twice.
This is one of those models that often makes me go, “Wow, I can’t believe I own one of these.”
#90143 Silverado, offered through the January/February 2008 JAH issue, is one of the most popular of the fifty Connoisseur models. People love the Wintersong sculpt, people love silver bay, and people love really well executed paint jobs. Roll those into one model and you’ve got Silverado.
Mine is #113/350 and I bought him from my friend Beth in May 2018. She gave me a “friend price” that was slightly under his current market value. The timing of his purchase worked out well for me (though not so much for Beth; sorry, Beth) because a year or two later, his market price tripled, then quadrupled. I could never afford to pay what he goes for now.
Beth showed him successfully with the name Evenstar Conquest. I totally forgot he had NAN cards and a name when she sold him to me, so I gave him the name Napa Valley. He did well for me for a few shows, though he is temporarily retired until I can get around to fixing an eartip rub he picked up somewhere along the way.
And now … drumroll please … here is my favorite model in my entire collection.
#90143 Silverado, offered through the January/February 2008 JAH issue, is one of the most popular of the fifty Connoisseur models. People love the Wintersong sculpt, people love silver bay, and people love really well executed paint jobs. Roll those into one model and you’ve got Silverado.
Mine is #113/350 and I bought him from my friend Beth in May 2018. She gave me a “friend price” that was slightly under his current market value. The timing of his purchase worked out well for me (though not so much for Beth; sorry, Beth) because a year or two later, his market price tripled, then quadrupled. I could never afford to pay what he goes for now.
Beth showed him successfully with the name Evenstar Conquest. I totally forgot he had NAN cards and a name when she sold him to me, so I gave him the name Napa Valley. He did well for me for a few shows, though he is temporarily retired until I can get around to fixing an eartip rub he picked up somewhere along the way.
And now … drumroll please … here is my favorite model in my entire collection.
This horse.
It was March of 2003 and I had just resubscribed to JAH after a 10-year hiatus. I was sitting in my apartment in Columbus, Ohio, turning the pages of the March/April 2023 magazine, and wham.
It was March of 2003 and I had just resubscribed to JAH after a 10-year hiatus. I was sitting in my apartment in Columbus, Ohio, turning the pages of the March/April 2023 magazine, and wham.
Never in my life have I instantly wanted to own a model horse as much as I wanted to own #90124 Fortissimo, the twelfth entry in the Connoisseur series.
I submitted my card for him right away (you entered through snail mail back then) and anxiously awaited the drawing. I had to have him. I looked at his picture almost every day.
I didn’t get drawn.
To say I was disappointed is an understatement.
I eventually managed to put it aside, but I still looked at that page in that magazine all the freaking time.
Once I got through grad school and rejoined the hobby in 2010, I started actively looking for Fortissimo on the secondary market. I had a TON of near-misses, probably half a dozen, including one priced at a mere $225. His price had already started to climb by then and I despaired of ever being fast enough to grab one at a price I could afford.
Then I went to BreyerFest in 2013 and found one for sale at the CHIN. He was $600, which was more than I wanted to pay, but he was my holy grail, and I’d been looking for so long and missed out on so many, and I could inspect every millimeter of him right there in person. As soon as I held him in my hands, I knew I wasn’t going to walk away without owning him. I handed him back to the seller and asked if she could hold him for me for just a minute while I made a quick phone call.
That call was to my parents. I’d already spent a good bit of my BreyerFest money and didn’t have enough cash on hand to buy him outright. I asked my parents if they would front me the difference and allow me to pay them back. I knew they’d just give me the money without the expectation of repayment - they have always been enablers of my collection in the best way - but Fortissimo was my grail, the model I desired most for ten straight years, and it was really important to me to purchase him myself. They agreed, and I went back into the room and gave the seller the $300 I had left, with an agreement to send the rest in two weeks. She’d ship him to me as soon as she had the second payment.
I left the room in a daze, walked down to the CHIN bar where my friends were hanging out, sat down, and said, “I just spent $600 on a Fortissimo, I need a beer.”
At the time, that was by far the most I’d ever spent on a model horse. I was both horrified and so ecstatic I could barely talk. My friends found it quite entertaining.
I got a check in the mail from my parents shortly after I got back from BreyerFest, sent the other $300 plus shipping to the seller on July 31, and on August 10, 2013, ten years and five months after first seeing his picture in JAH, I finally had a Fortissimo on my shelves. He’s #146/350.
He’s been to 34 shows with me. He has 17 breed ribbons, 6 breed NAN cards, 16 collectibility ribbons, and 5 collectibility NAN cards. His show name is Crescendo, for obvious reasons.
Every time I pull him off the shelf to take him to a show; every time I get him out of the bin to put him on my table; every time I take him to and from the show table; every time he pins; every time I put him back in the bin after the show; and every time I put him back on the shelf, I say, “Hi, favorite!” Sometimes I even say it whenever I pass by his shelf in the horse room. When I toured Breyer headquarters in NJ during the Big Easy Bash, I took a picture of the Fortissimo on the shelves in the lobby and shared it on my Facebook with the caption, “Of course the Fortissimo in the lobby had to have a photograph of his own, since he's my favorite.” I shared my own Fortissimo on my Facebook for December photo challenges in both 2018 and 2019 on the “Favorite Model” day.
There will be other models I want, even some that might become grails because of how difficult they are to find, but there will never be another Fortissimo.
I submitted my card for him right away (you entered through snail mail back then) and anxiously awaited the drawing. I had to have him. I looked at his picture almost every day.
I didn’t get drawn.
To say I was disappointed is an understatement.
I eventually managed to put it aside, but I still looked at that page in that magazine all the freaking time.
Once I got through grad school and rejoined the hobby in 2010, I started actively looking for Fortissimo on the secondary market. I had a TON of near-misses, probably half a dozen, including one priced at a mere $225. His price had already started to climb by then and I despaired of ever being fast enough to grab one at a price I could afford.
Then I went to BreyerFest in 2013 and found one for sale at the CHIN. He was $600, which was more than I wanted to pay, but he was my holy grail, and I’d been looking for so long and missed out on so many, and I could inspect every millimeter of him right there in person. As soon as I held him in my hands, I knew I wasn’t going to walk away without owning him. I handed him back to the seller and asked if she could hold him for me for just a minute while I made a quick phone call.
That call was to my parents. I’d already spent a good bit of my BreyerFest money and didn’t have enough cash on hand to buy him outright. I asked my parents if they would front me the difference and allow me to pay them back. I knew they’d just give me the money without the expectation of repayment - they have always been enablers of my collection in the best way - but Fortissimo was my grail, the model I desired most for ten straight years, and it was really important to me to purchase him myself. They agreed, and I went back into the room and gave the seller the $300 I had left, with an agreement to send the rest in two weeks. She’d ship him to me as soon as she had the second payment.
I left the room in a daze, walked down to the CHIN bar where my friends were hanging out, sat down, and said, “I just spent $600 on a Fortissimo, I need a beer.”
At the time, that was by far the most I’d ever spent on a model horse. I was both horrified and so ecstatic I could barely talk. My friends found it quite entertaining.
I got a check in the mail from my parents shortly after I got back from BreyerFest, sent the other $300 plus shipping to the seller on July 31, and on August 10, 2013, ten years and five months after first seeing his picture in JAH, I finally had a Fortissimo on my shelves. He’s #146/350.
He’s been to 34 shows with me. He has 17 breed ribbons, 6 breed NAN cards, 16 collectibility ribbons, and 5 collectibility NAN cards. His show name is Crescendo, for obvious reasons.
Every time I pull him off the shelf to take him to a show; every time I get him out of the bin to put him on my table; every time I take him to and from the show table; every time he pins; every time I put him back in the bin after the show; and every time I put him back on the shelf, I say, “Hi, favorite!” Sometimes I even say it whenever I pass by his shelf in the horse room. When I toured Breyer headquarters in NJ during the Big Easy Bash, I took a picture of the Fortissimo on the shelves in the lobby and shared it on my Facebook with the caption, “Of course the Fortissimo in the lobby had to have a photograph of his own, since he's my favorite.” I shared my own Fortissimo on my Facebook for December photo challenges in both 2018 and 2019 on the “Favorite Model” day.
There will be other models I want, even some that might become grails because of how difficult they are to find, but there will never be another Fortissimo.
