Shane McCord Gardner attended Art College in London and was apprenticed to Grattan Freyer in Ireland and Carl McConnell in Queensland before setting up his Upper River Pottery in Kangaroo Vallery, NSW, where he specialised in functional salt-glazed wood-fired stoneware. He has entries in the 1981, 1985 and 1986 potters' directories. His works are marked with an impressed 'Shane Gardner Potter' stamp or 'SG' monogram. In the 1986 directory, Upper River Pottery also has its own 'UP' seal.