You might have to come back more than once to eyeball and drool over the upcoming Kahaner vintage trims that I am finally putting up for destash (for now, only on Facebook closed group of Aussie Beaders Destash & Swap). If you are an early bird/reader, you might not see much. Unlike the normal post, this goes live before it is complete. This will be a piece meal affair. I will add photos, one by one, as and when I complete photographing and listing each Kahaner vintage beaded trimming.
I have had these magnificent trims for ever so many years. And if you Google search, you will find why I have hang on to them so tenaciously. It is virtually impossible to find any!! So I have caressed, moo-moo-eyed, whispered sweet nothings to my beloved vintage lace, trims, tassels, and stash for many years. What I have not done is to make use of them. I could not bear it.
However as my life moves along, I know that it is better to let these go (or some of it) to someone(s) out there. I am sure there must be cluey people who will appreciate, value, treasure, and maybe even creatively employ these extraordinary vintage beaded trims and braids.
Sol Kahaner & Bro.
Sol Kahaner & Bro. was successfully run by 2 brothers, Sol and Hy Kahaner. The company, Sol Kahaner & Bro. no longer exists as far as I know. I cannot find information on their dissolution. However I did read about it years ago. Apparently the House of Kahaner produced magnicent and much sought after trims in their heyday. I did find a number of old newspaper archives to prove this point.
Kahaner Vintage Trims (beaded)
All these trims and tassels are believed to have been produced in the 1950s/60s or even earlier.
The first beaded vintage trim is the 2cm (approximate) wide fully beaded soft trimming in silver lined beades, silver foiling, and pearls.
This next one shows much metallic embellishment and work. I find the crystals a treasure as they are NOT moulded. Each of them are cut crystals with lovely crisp edges.
Today we have the very highly unusual vintage acrylic plastic beaded trimmings. Vintage acrylic beaded trimmings are much harder to find than glass or even the crystal versions.
Today I think I will post and list at least 2 vintage trims.
This first one is a vintage open-work trim. In some parts, it is a little bit fragile but the whole trim is so delightfully soft and pliable. I believe they are made of nylon beads and thickly silver-lined glass beads. Delightful to feel and hold.
This next vintage trimming with faceted glass drops is rather exquisite. The drops have crisp cut edges. They are not moulded. The seed beads on the braid sits on a most unusual curvy bead base. Edged with pearly long oval beads. The width, including the drop, is about 4cm.
This vintage beauty really deserves more than one detailed photo. So I have 2 photos for this one.
16//02/15
Love this next set of vintage trims as well. They encapture both the vintage as well as modern edgy feel. Maybe I should just say vintage-modern? Still in very good condition.
18/02/15
While I love and adore all of my precious Kahaner vintage trims, I am now getting to some of the ones I really ADORE. Today...
Kahaner Vintage Trim in White and Silver with White Hearts and White Cut Crystal Dangles. Very soft and pliable trim. All hand sewn.
As always, when using, I recommend rethreading through all the thread pathways for extra strength and security.
Vintage Acrylic Nylon trimming. Central cluster. Zig Zag edging. 5cm wide.
26/02/15
This is the last of the vintage trimmings with full beading I am going to display here. I think so. Unless I have a hidden and forgotten box somewhere. And that is always possible!
This is probably my most, most favourite, my All Time Treasure. My educated guess would be that it is made of MOP (Mother of Pearl) drop discs (of a nice thick size) and cut rivoli crystal drops in Jet black. All hand-sewn of course. And the backing is soft .. it looks like velvet cording. Very Very Nice! And that really is an understatement.
Vintage Tassels and Fringes
Tassels and fringes were extremely popular especially in the 1920s and 1930s. They made a huge revival in the 1960s in hippie-ponchos, tops and skirts.
Tassels and fringes are perhaps most associated with flapper dresses which were all the rage in the 1920s-30s. And once again, tassles in all its many forms and uses are making a delightful, welcomed comeback today.
They are used on dresses, cushions, bags, drop tassels, home decor and of course, jewelry.
To start my to-be-destashed vintage tassels range: the long 20cm Emerald Green fringe tassel probably manufactured between 1920 – 1950s.
Addendum 25 July 2025
Sorry!Life got in the way. I have been away from this page for a very long time! Over a decade! Things - Life-things - happened!!!
I am moving from a WordPress (WP) platform (too expensive for my needs now) to Google's free Blogger platform. What follows are some of the copied comments from the WP platform. I am copying them because they are too precious to lose: especially the comments from the Kahaner family members who had "found" each other and hopefully re-connected via the earlier version of this post.
(Also for administrative ease, I have disallowed comments on this Blogger platform. Sorry folks!)
Previous Comments
(copied from WP platform)
March 11, 2020 at 4:09 am
ℋkahaner@aol.com
I enjoyed your Kahaner page, I purchased Kahaner in 1989 and ran it for over 20 years and sold it to one of my clients in California. I actually have a climate controlled storage room with 10 cartons of antique Kahaner trim going back to the 1930’s. It was all the fanciest and best trims and rhinestones from over the years I figured maybe my kids would want it one day. What a great piece of history!
April 19, 2020 at 2:58 am
ℋ(adam@adamkravitz.com)
Hi, I can across this site a few years ago and have been meaning to comment – I see from the above comment that people are still looking at it and this site and Helena are still active.
To be honest, coming across this page is one of the random miracles of the Internet. It blows me away that anyone would be collecting Kahaner trim.
My grandfather was Hy Kahaner (the “Brother”, although there were a few more, not in the business) and I can fill you in on the history of the company. I spent plenty of time at the offices on W 38th Street and have also been honored to meet many of his friends and acquaintances around the world through the years (he was even on one of the first US trade missions to China in 1975 to buy Chinese trim). The company was bought by Willcox & Gibbs (an English sewing machine company that expanded to become a conglomerate) in 1970 and became a division that my grandfather was president of. By the late 1980’s he had retired and become a consultant. Eventually, W&G was bought by Rexel, an electrical company, and I believe by the mid-1990’s they sold off House of Kahaner – I know the trademark lapsed in 1993.
One point that I had wanted to mention is the dating of the items in the post. If they have a Willcox & Gibbs label then they are post-1970, not from the 50’s and 60’s. The others are probably from the 1960’s as the labels I can see have zip codes (first introduced in 1963). I also note that a lot of the items are made in Hong Kong, which is where they manufactured in the later years. Stuff from Haiti and Puerto Rico would more likely have been from the 50’s up through the mid-1960’s.
I am curious about the comment by Rob above. I am not sure who bought HoK from W&G – my mother seems to recall it was something like “Vegas Cigar” – and in the later years, my grandfather was very involved with House of Fabrics in California, so maybe that’s the connection. In any event, I would be very interested in finding out what Kahaner trim you have stored and if you would be interested in selling/parting with some of it so that my family could have some.
I would also look forward to communicating with Helena.
March 8, 2021 at 2:09am
This is susan Kahaner. Sol ‘s daughter. Who is Hy’s granddaughter/ we are related!!
March 8, 2021 at 2:47am
ℋ(adam@adamkravitz.com)
Hi, I know who you are, my mom says I met you as a kid. I’m Adam (grandson..not daughter!), Diana’s son. You can reach me at akravitz@beckerlawyers.com, I’d love to hear from you.