Dazzling for Dollars: ‘Diamond Necklace Affair’ To Aid Homeless By Rewriting History February 16, 1989 – Posted in: Press

Published: February 16, 1989
Palm Beach Daily News

A Palm Beach estate jewelry house is planning a diamond-studded Marie Antoinette gala that would make the infamous queen eat her own words.

The House of Kahn, estate jewelers for more than 30 years, is presenting “The Diamond Necklace Affair,” a March 2 extravaganza featuring a dazzling collection of diamond jewelry billed in the name of the 18th century French queen who callously uttered “let them eat cake” and agitated a revolution.

Powdered wigs and snuff boxes will be de rigueur at the affair that intends to rewrite history and offer a welcomed historical twist” Ten percent of the diamond collection’s sales will go toward the Lord’s Place, a shelter for the homeless in West Palm Beach.

That’s because Adele Kahn, co-owner of the House of Kahn with her husband, Edward, feels the homeless problem is the most pressing issue facing Americans today.

The numbers says she’s right.

According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, the largest advocacy group, there are 3 million nationwide without a home. And a congressionally mandated study contends that those numbers will rocket to 19 million by about the year 2000.

“So many people turn their backs or want to pretend they don’t see it,” Mrs. Kahn said one afternoon in her elegant, chandeliered jewelry house of Peruvian Ave. “And despite what people assume about Palm Beach, the homeless are here too. Someone’s got to do something about it.”

The “Diamond” affair is what Mrs. Kahn intends to do about it. That likely will be no small contribution, as several of the jewel pieces, to be displayed by models in French aristocratic dress, are carefully crafted, elaborate collectors’ items from the 1920s, ’30s and ’60s, periods of abundant and extravagant jewelry-making. Prices range from about $5,000 to $500,000, a price that would have impressed Marie Antoinette herself.

Director of the Lord’s Place, Brother Joe Ranieri, is pleased. With a small staff and 600 unpaid volunteers, he is feeding and housing temporarily homeless families in two area shelters. One is in Boynton Beach, while the West Palm Beach shelter, which opened in 1983, has provided shelter for over 300 families, helping them find jobs and, eventually, apartments of their own.

“The point is,” Mrs. Kahn explained, “What better way to spur people’s awareness of the homeless problem than by figuratively showing that that horrible queen herself has had a change of heart and will sell her jewels for the homeless. If she were alive today, she wouldn’t be eating cake. She’d be eating her words.”