Consolidating the brands that dress the majority.
Brykap Holding Group acquires, scales, and stewards apparel brands in the $80 billion plus-size market — the world's least effectively served clothing vertical.
The opportunity →A market the size of a nation, served as an afterthought.
Plus-size women are the majority of the market, yet only a fraction of apparel is made for them. This is not a trend — it is a permanent, structural mismatch between demand and supply.
The time to build is when the category is out of favor.
The time to buy is when there is blood in the streets.Nathan Rothschild
Motivated sellers
Older vintage funds are unnatural holders of trapped brands — assets that need capital, knowhow, and patience they no longer have.
Pricing power
Capital has fled the consumer and retail sector. With little competing capital, disciplined buyers set the terms.
A steep learning curve
Inclusive sizing demands specialized knowledge and a nuanced customer. Few firms will pay to climb a curve we descended generations ago.
A reshaping curve
GLP-1 medications reallocate the size curve; they do not erase it. As customers move, demand moves with them — and can be captured.
The family that built this market is building its next chapter.
Family heritage
Michael Kaplan's great-grandmother, Lena “Lane Bryant” Bryant, created the most recognized name in plus-size apparel. His father was the last family member to lead it. The press halo and customer credibility are unmatched.
Complete infrastructure
Supply chain, sourcing, design, mills, technology, and operators — aligned on one platform, many of them as partners and investors rather than vendors.
A unified team
The Lane Bryant founding family, reunited with senior operators who have led design, merchandising, sourcing, finance, and digital at scale.
One hundred and thirty years, in a single reel.
From a pawned pair of earrings to the company that invented plus-size apparel — and on to the operating house carrying the work forward. Open the full record →
One family. One hundred and thirty years of dressing the overlooked.
From a pawned pair of earrings to the company that invented plus-size apparel — and on to the operating house carrying the work forward.
Drag · scroll · →A girl is born in Lithuania
Lena Himmelstein is born in Lithuania, then part of Czarist Russia, and orphaned days later. She is raised amid persecution she will never forget.
Steerage to America
At sixteen, Lena sails to New York in steerage. Refusing an arranged marriage, she takes work in a Lower-East-Side sweatshop for a dollar a week and learns to sew lingerie.
A widow with a sewing machine
She marries jeweler David Bryant; their son Raphael is born. Six months later David dies of tuberculosis. Lena pawns her diamond earrings to make the down payment on a Singer sewing machine.
“Lane Bryant” is born
Opening a bank account, the timid young widow misspells her own name on the deposit slip — “Lane,” not “Lena.” She grows to like it. The brand is named by accident.
The engineer arrives
Lena marries Albert Malsin, a mechanical engineer who brings cost accounting and sizing science to the craft — and the discipline that turns a shop into an institution.
The advertisement that sold out
The New York Herald runs the first maternity advertisement ever printed. The entire stock sells out in a single day — $2,800 — and Lane Bryant's fame begins.
Owned by the people who built it
Incorporated as Lane Bryant, Inc., the company lets its employees subscribe to a quarter of the stock — among the first profit-sharing plans in American retail.
The invention of plus-size
With a flexible yardstick, Malsin measures 4,500 customers and 200,000 records, finding that ~40% of women exceeded the “perfect 36.” Lane Bryant designs for them — and invents modern plus-size apparel.
A category comes of age
Albert Malsin dies. By now, larger-size sales have overtaken maternity, and the business has grown to some $5 million a year across a growing chain of stores.
A national institution
As the chain expands across the country, Lane Bryant establishes its annual Volunteer Awards for distinguished public service — later presented at the White House.
The founder's last day at the office
Lena “Lane Bryant” Malsin dies at seventy-two, still keeping an office in the New York store — a national institution built from a pawned pair of earrings.
A quarter-billion-dollar company
Under Raphael Malsin, the company reaches record sales of $277.5 million — and earns national renown for public service.
The next generation
Michael Kaplan, Lena's great-grandson, founds Fashion to Figure — carrying the family's plus-size legacy into a new century of retail.
Proven again
Fashion to Figure sells a substantial stake to private equity at 4.5× its prior valuation — and is later acquired by New York & Co.
Brykap Holding Group
Michael Kaplan reunites the Lane Bryant founding family with a world-class operating team to acquire, scale, and steward the brands that serve the majority of women — the next chapter of a 130-year story.
We acquire proven affinity, then supply everything else.
We focus on existing brands where our operating resources, relationships, and experience deliver economic payback before the business plan even begins.
Established brand & audience
The expensive, slow work of building identity and a loyal customer base is already done. We look for resonance we can amplify, not invent.
Apparel we can extend
Women's apparel that our resources can improve and expand — across size range, category, and distribution channel.
Immediate EBITDA
Economics our sourcing, margin, materials, inventory, and payables relationships can expand from day one — not someday.
A permanent home for distinctive brands.
Permanence over exit
An operating holding company holds. We are stewards, not flippers.
Founders keep their voice
We partner with founders and families who want to stay involved and keep their brand distinctive — and we hand them a century of operating muscle.
Operators, not spectators
Capital is the least of what we bring. Our partners invest time and expertise, not only money.
To serve the majority with the fit, dignity, and taste it has been denied.
To build an enduring company that serves the majority of women with the fit, dignity, and taste the market has long withheld — and to create lasting value for the founders, families, and partners who build it with us.
The resources that power the platform — many of them invested in it.
Our partners are operating resources at global scale who align with the platform as investors, not vendors — ensuring compelling margins, terms, and reach from day one.
Think you might be a fit?
For founders, families, and strategic partners. Tell us about your brand or your interest — we read everything.
- Founders & families
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