To make their work more visible to the design and architecture trades, the Ackermans move the ERA showroom to Melrose Avenue at San Vicente Boulevard. Pacific Design Center will later be built across the street.
As ERA Industries grows, Jerome’s increasing responsibilities for design, production, and marketing necessitate the discontinuation of the Jenev ceramics line. The Ackermans’ daughter, Laura, is born.
Evelyn experiments with the hand-hooking technique, leading to a group of designs for area rugs that are produced in Japan. Unable to compete with large rug manufacturers, they produce smaller pieces for use as wall hangings, adding new designs over the years.
Evelyn designs and they produce their initial group of carved-wood bas-relief wall panels, the first of which is St. George and the Dragon. Jerome employs the multiple-spindle machine used in the furniture industry to rough out carvings that are hand finished.
Evelyn designs an exterior mosaic mural, Sea, Land, and Sky, for a Louis Mazzeti office building on Victoria Street, Santa Barbara.
Experimenting with new materials, Evelyn explores the silk screen process and produces a series of designs on various materials, with Kites as her first design.
Jerome designs a colorful collection of porcelain-enameled metal wall sconces and candleholders.
Jenev becomes ERA Industries when the Ackermans form a partnership with Jerome’s high school classmate, architect Sherrill Broudy. Several years later the Ackermans buy Broudy out but keep the company name.
Evelyn designs a two-story mosaic mural, Fantasy Landscape, for the exterior of an apartment building on Kiowa Avenue in West Los Angeles. It is registered with the Los Angeles Mural Conservancy.
During this time, the Ackermans associate with fellow potters Peter Voulkos, Otto and Vivika Heino, and Laura Andreson. They attend a meeting of the American Ceramic Society, design division, and become members of the American Craftsman Council.