Paulino Bernabé Roman (born in 1960) is a world class maker as was his father, Paulino Bernabé Almendariz (1932-2007).  Although Paulino literally grew up in his father's shop, he began formally working with his father in the early 1980s. Father and son continued to work side by side until the elder Bernabé died, and their work became indistinguishable. Like his father, Paulino Jr. is a not only a superb craftsman, but also an experimenter constantly seeking to improve both construction methods and various sound qualities of the guitar. In the years since his father's passing, Paulino has gained international recognition as a world class maker. 

Although the model 15 is not at the top of Bernabé's line of models, it is a fully professional concert guitar, and has the volume, projection, and quality of sound to prove it. As Paulino explained his approach to me, he noted it takes almost as much time to build an estudio model as it does a top model (artistic decorations aside), so why waste time building a guitar of inferior materials. Even in his model 5, he uses top grade woods that one expects in a concert guitar.  What changes as one goes up his line is that the materials become ever finer, ever rarer, and at the top nearly impossible to find-- woods that may be up to a century or more old-- woods with spectacular grain or unique figures. In the upper models rare woods are combined  high-end machine tuners, and fine marquetry, French polish, and other time consuming bits of the luthiers art to create master pieces. While there are appreciable differences in quality of sound as one climbs up his latter of models-- heard primarily as increasing clarity and richness of tone--his model 15 has the same instantly recognizable Bernabé character--a bold, firm Spanish sound, great volume, projection, presence, evenness of tone, balance, and wide palate of color.