06 - Portefeuille-Fabrik Kahn

Around 1910, the Rudolf Kahn portfolio company expanded its leather goods factory with a new building with a neoclassical façade.

Like other neighboring small and medium-sized businesses, Kahn also used the railroad connection between Offenbach a. M. and Frankfurt a. M., which was put into operation in 1848 and along whose route Berliner Straße runs today. From the second half of the 19th century, the "Portefeuiller district" developed along the southern Ludwigstraße, where purses, cases, ladies' handbags and other Offenbach small leather specialties were produced. Production mostly took place in inconspicuous backyard factories.

It was not until the economic upswing after the turn of the century and the discussion promoted by the Deutscher Werkbund on the combination of product function and quality craftsmanship that companies began to invest in their architectural and aesthetic representation and relocated their operations from the backyards to the prestigious street front.