First Wear · Kolotex 1960s 15-Denier Seamless Nylons, Original Box
15-denier seamless mesh nylon · Trikolon yarn · Kolotex Clings · made in Australia · 1960s · SOLERO shade · marked 8.5-9 vintage sizing
The box has the poodle on it. Inside, the stockings are still in their original Trikolon-yarn gold foil wrapper, sealed and unworn, a pale tan waiting in cardboard since the 1960s. There is something deeply satisfying about deadstock hosiery: the thing made to be used up and discarded, sitting here sixty years later in its original packaging, entirely intact.
Kolotex Clings, made in Australia, 1960s. The Leichhardt factory at the height of its seamless nylon range, when Australian hosiery manufacturing was a serious industry and the word Trikolon on the packet meant something about the quality of the knit. Seamless construction was the technical achievement of the era, eliminating the back seam that had defined sheer stockings since the 1920s.
The box is well-worn from storage. The foil inside is intact. SOLERO shade, marked 8.5 to 9 in the vintage sizing of the period.
A complete object. The box alone is worth something.
Care
Nylon of this age is delicate. Wear with care, if at all. The box alone is a complete object.
More on looking after vintage pieces in our care guide.
Size
Measured flat: Marked 8.5-9 in vintage Kolotex sizing. Seamless mesh construction stretches to fit a range.
Our size guide explains how vintage sizing is read here.
Condition
Deadstock, in the original box. The foil is sealed and the stockings unworn. SOLERO shade, marked 8.5-9 in vintage Kolotex sizing.
Our condition lexicon explains the grades we use.
Before it reaches you
Someone loved this before you did, and I try to honour that properly. Each piece is hand washed, or cleaned in the way that the fabric permits, then steamed until it softens and straightens and feels newly attended to. Wherever a button was missing, it has been replaced with a vintage one from my long-kept collection. Wherever a hem had given way, I fix it by hand. By the time it leaves this room it is genuinely clean, pressed, whole, and looked over one final time before I let myself believe it is ready. Not restored. Not made new. Just returned to a state where it can be loved again, by someone who was not there the first time.
A stocking is the most disposable thing a wardrobe ever held, made to be laddered and thrown out by Friday, and this pair has beaten the whole premise by staying sealed in gold foil for sixty years. The poodle on the box has been guarding a first wear that never came and shows no sign of standing down. Seamless was the great technical triumph of the decade, the vanishing of the back seam, and these have carried the idea to its conclusion by declining to be worn at all. Keep the box: the stockings inside are a promise, and promises wear better unbroken.