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Lane Bryant tody is a chain store focusing on fashion for larger size women. The store began with a focus on maternity clothes. The founder was Lena Himmelstein Bryant Malsin (1879?-1951), a Jewish n immigrant from Lithuania--at the time a Tsarist Russian province. Lane Bryant is the accidental Americanized version of her name which was used for the chain of stores she founded. was an U.S. clothing designer and retailer who founded the maternity clothing chain Lane Bryant. She was born in Lithuania, but raised by her grandparents. She immigrated to America at age 16, the cheapest way possible--in steerage. It was planned that she marry a distant relative, but instead found a job in a swearshop like many immigrant girls at the time. She earned $1 a week at a sweat shop on Lispenard Street. She married a jeweler, David Bryant,about 1899. She worked with him in his modest Brooklyn store. Their first child Raphael was born soonafter (1900). Tragically her husband died 6 months after Raphael arrived. She was left with nothing. She was taken in by her sister Anna who had a small apartment on West 112th Street. Rather than return to the sweatshops, she decided to use her talents to make high-end garments. She began making negligees and tea gowns using delicate laces and fine silks to well-to-do customers. From that simple beginning grew one of the major American retail clothing chains. The company trned to catalogs in part because newspapers would not accept adds for maternity clothes. The catalogs offered women's clothing along with clothing for younger children.
Lane Bryant is a chain store focusing on fashion for larger size women. The store began with a focus on maternity clothes. Of course clotes for stout ladies is very similar to maternity wear. The company also launched a mail order operation which included items for younger children. The catalog helped get around
the refsal of newspapers to accept ads for clothes described as 'maternity' clothes. This was, however, a small part of the catalogs. The company today has anout 200 stores and a web-based operationand focuses on sizes for larger women.
The founder of the company was a young immigrant woman, Lena Himmelstein Bryant Malsin (1879?-1951). She was born in Lithuania. Lane Bryant is the accidental Americanized version of her name which was used for the chain of stores she founded. was an U.S. clothing designer and retailer who founded the maternity clothing chain Lane Bryant. She was born in Lithuania, but raised by her grandparents. She immigrated to America at age 16, the cheapest way possible--in steerage. It was planned that she marry a distant relative, but instead found a job in a sweatshop like many immigrant gifrls at the time. She earned $1 a week at a sweat shop on Lispenard Street.
Lithuania in the late-19th century was a part of the Russuian Empire. Anti-Semetic programs launched by Tsar Alexander III. The result was terrible progroms. But even those Jews not killed by the pograms found life increaingly difficult. Lena was but one of the hundreds of thousands of Eastern European Jews that pourded into Germany and America from various parts of the Russian Empire in the late 19th century. Because of Russian anti-Semetic laws, Jews from Eastern Europe had been restricted as to what occupations they could persue. As a result many of the Jews that came to America had experience with both retail and tailoring. These were thus two economic sectors most affected by Jewish immigration. And Jews from the Nltic area and Poland were often called Russin Jews.
Jobs for women were extremely limited in the late 19th century. One of the few areas that immigrant women could find jobs was the garment industry. Entrepreneurs in major cities open sweat shops employing mostly immigrant girls and women. The industrial revolution had begun with cotton fabric mills and mills as well as garment plants were in the late 19th century still a very important part of the production of industrialized countries. The working conditions in the big city sweat shops were very poor and the wages very low. It was one of these shops that Lena began working in when she came to America. These shops became a trget of the Progressive movement, because of how they exploited immigrant workers and the fct that the employees were mostly children and women. The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire (1911). The victims were mostly Italian and Jewish immigrant children and young women. The tragedy brought conditions in the industry to the attention of the American public.
Lena married a jeweler, David Bryant,about 1899. This seemed to provide a way out of poverty and sweat shop labor. She worked with him in his modest Brooklyn store. Their first child Raphael was born soon after (1900). Tragically her husband died 6 months after Raphael arrived.
Lena was a widow left with nothing. She was taken in by her suster Anna who had a small apartment on West 112th St. Rather than return to the sweat shops, she decided to use her talents to make high-end garments. She began making negligees and tea gowns using delicate laces and fine silks to well-to-do customers. From that simple beginning grew one of the major American retail clothing chains.
Brynt's garments proved popular, allowing her to move to her own quarters. She rented the ground floor of a new building at 1489 Fifth Avenue, between 119th and 120th Streets. The rent was $12.50 a month. She, Rafael, and her sister used the rear for their living quarters and the front to make garments.
When her sister married, her brother-in-law loaned her $300. This allowed her to open a bank account which provided working capital to buy fabrics for her garments. It was at this point that the name Lane Bryant. A clerk at the bank mispelled her name.
It was at this time that Bryant began to be noticed. Pregnant mothers and particularly stout ladies found that her tea gowns were more flattering than what was available in the stores. Bryant began making maternity wear--a fashion sector not than available in established stores. Bryant used elastic bands and pleating in constructing her tea gowns. Of course fashions for amply proportioned ladies was only a short additiuonal step. Her garments proved so popular that she was able to open a proper shop at 19 West 38th St.
Not long after she met Albert Malsin who was also from Lithuania. He was an educated man, having graduated from the Gothen Polytechnic Instutute in Annhalt, Germany. He presumably studied in Germany because as a Jew he had difficulty getting acceted in Russian universities. His degree was in mechanical engineering. At the time he was working with an engineering firm that built amusement parks in America and other countries. The two married in 1909. Malsin began to manage their business. He began to apply sophisticated managerial techniques to the operation and to expand the business. The couple had three children of their own (Theodore, Helen and Arthur).
Bryant produced her garments intuitively without any patterns. Malsin introduced mass production techniques that introduced effiencies in the operation as well a professional accounting practices. Lane Bryant achieved sales of $50,000 annually by 1910. Malsin decided that the best prospects lay with specialization.
The company more and more focused on maternity dresses. Modern cutting machines were acquired and work contracted out to be done by Lane Bryant patterns.
One very important step was the introduction of a mail order catalog business. This was especially important because pregnacy was still a very delicate topic in America dyring the early 20th century. Once prgnacy started to show, pregnant women were expected to stay at home in virtual seclusion. Not only did society expect this, but pregnant women themselves were uncomfortable in public venues. Thus the ability to order from home by mail order catalogs was a major plus for the company. The company's catalogs not only offered maternity wear, but fashionable clothing for stout ladies as well. There were separate catalogss for both. The company recgognizing that mothers also bought the children's clothes, added items for younger children and girls. The catalogs were not like Sears and Wards, but were substantial. The 1919 catalogs for maternity wear was 76 pages. The catalog for stout ladies was 52 pages. An example of a Lane Bryant catalog archived on HBC is a page from the 1935 catalog. Lane Bryant deals primarily with women's clothing, but the catalog has offered children's clothing. We have note catalogs for both large women and maternity clothes. A HBC reader tells us that the underwear page here was from a catalog specifically for children. Our HBC contributor writes, "I have the whole catalog. The union suits and waist suits are on a different page. The entire catalog was for children. Lane Bryant is now known as a large woman sized store. So this is from an era when they still carried children's clothes." We do not know if these children's wear catalogs were done for just a few years in the 1930s or for a longer period.
The results of professional management and the mail order operation were spectacular. Lane Bryant reported sales exceeding $1 million in 1917.
The company with 207 stores was purchased by the Limited in 1982. The mail order division was called, Brylane. Limited sold the Lane Bryant to Charming Shoppes in 2001. The company continues to be America’s largest specialty apparel store for larger than average women. There were in 2005, over 650 stores, mostly in malls.
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