{"id":2122,"date":"2019-10-23T07:02:30","date_gmt":"2019-10-23T07:02:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-ons\/geschiedenis\/"},"modified":"2026-10-13T08:53:05","modified_gmt":"2026-10-13T08:53:05","slug":"history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/about-us\/history\/","title":{"rendered":"History"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a family with a long tradition of working with leather goods, Willem-Jan<br \/>\nBeernink was surrounded by leather bags and design from a young age. This is how his deep affinity for the craft developed.<\/p>\n<p>His grandparents began selling leather laces and hides for making leather soles in 1936. Leather bags followed later, which were sold at the market and resold. His father continued the wholesale bag business, after which he and Willem-Jan decided to launch their own brand in 1993. Bear Design was born!<\/p>\n<p>Since then, the BEAR brand has been a leading name in the Netherlands, but has also built up a strong international reputation, as can be seen in Germany.<\/p>\n<p>Willem-Jan is still involved in design and purchasing, alongside his sister Annelies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a family with a long tradition of working with leather goods, Willem-Jan Beernink was surrounded by leather bags and design from a young age. This is how his deep affinity for the craft developed. His grandparents began selling leather laces and hides for making leather soles in 1936. Leather bags followed later, which were [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":1227,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2122","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>History - Bear<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The founder of Bear Design is Willem-Jan Beernink. However, his affinity for leather bags and design goes back much further than the launch of the Bear Design label in 1993.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"History - Bear\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The founder of Bear Design is Willem-Jan Beernink. However, his affinity for leather bags and design goes back much further than the launch of the Bear Design label in 1993.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Bear\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/beardesigntassen\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-10-13T08:53:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/over-bear-design\\\/geschiedenis\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/over-bear-design\\\/geschiedenis\\\/\",\"name\":\"History - Bear\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2019-10-23T07:02:30+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-10-13T08:53:05+00:00\",\"description\":\"The founder of Bear Design is Willem-Jan Beernink. However, his affinity for leather bags and design goes back much further than the launch of the Bear Design label in 1993.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/over-bear-design\\\/geschiedenis\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/over-bear-design\\\/geschiedenis\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/over-bear-design\\\/geschiedenis\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"About BEAR\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/en\\\/about-us\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"History\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/\",\"name\":\"Bear\",\"description\":\"Tassen en accessoires van Bear kenmerken zich door een solide kwaliteit, aangeboden in een ruim assortiment met een zeer goede prijs-kwaliteitverhouding.\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.beardesign.nl\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"History - Bear","description":"The founder of Bear Design is Willem-Jan Beernink. However, his affinity for leather bags and design goes back much further than the launch of the Bear Design label in 1993.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"History - Bear","og_description":"The founder of Bear Design is Willem-Jan Beernink. However, his affinity for leather bags and design goes back much further than the launch of the Bear Design label in 1993.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/","og_site_name":"Bear","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/beardesigntassen","article_modified_time":"2026-10-13T08:53:05+00:00","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Est. reading time":"1 minute"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/","name":"History - Bear","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/#website"},"datePublished":"2019-10-23T07:02:30+00:00","dateModified":"2026-10-13T08:53:05+00:00","description":"The founder of Bear Design is Willem-Jan Beernink. However, his affinity for leather bags and design goes back much further than the launch of the Bear Design label in 1993.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/over-bear-design\/geschiedenis\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"About BEAR","item":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/about-us\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"History"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/","name":"Bear","description":"Tassen en accessoires van Bear kenmerken zich door een solide kwaliteit, aangeboden in een ruim assortiment met een zeer goede prijs-kwaliteitverhouding.","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2122"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2122\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7408,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2122\/revisions\/7408"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardesign.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}