Helena Schargel encourages women to come out of the shadows with her lingerie brand
Wearing a set of black lace lingerie, Brazilian Helena Schargel poses seductively in her late 80s for a photo shoot for her latest collection of lingerie for older women.
«Very good, wonderful!», approves the photographer, while she looks confidently towards the camera.
After several decades working in a textile company, this energetic woman decided to retire three years ago. She and she reinvented herself by founding a project to bring older women out of the dark.
Her strategy? Design intimate fashion aimed at older women and be the model herself.
“It is a project that has a purpose: to bring women out of invisibility,” she says Schargel.
After launching several intimate fashion collections under the Recco Lingerie brand. This year she ventured into the world of sportswear creating a line for Alto Giro.
Schargel, who collaborates with the design of the garments, assures that women over 60 in Brazil are ignored for a long time by fashion companies, by society and even by themselves.
She shares messages of encouragement on her Instagram account, where she has almost 18,000 followers, mostly women of all ages. "Don't be afraid to take risks" or "who told you you can't?" She questions them in her posts.
«I never thought about my age, this never worried me. It was a short time ago that I realized that I am no longer 33,” says the entrepreneur.
The daughter of Polish immigrants, Schargel was a teenager when she started making clothes and selling them in her parents' clothing store.
It was just the beginning of a life devoted to fashion. Along the way, she was married twice and had two children. She now has five grandsons and granddaughters, and some of them wear her creations.
Do I know how to file my own taxes? No. But do I know how to play hot cross buns on a recorder? You fucking bet your bottom dollar
— Georgia Jensen Sun Jul 25 22:56:06 +0000 2021
absurdly comfortable clothes
Schargel's decision to model in underwear is daring in a macho country that treats women after a certain age "as if they were no longer alive," says Vogue Brasil editor Paula Merlo.
"She reminds you that there is life after 60, 70 and that it can be a sexy, fun life and also profitable," she adds.
Overcoming the initial fear, Schargel assures that she feels comfortable showing herself in public with little clothing.
And she, determined to appear as natural as possible, insists that she does not want her photos edited.
“I always ask, please, leave my wrinkles as they are,” she says. "They are very important. They show that I have come this far », she adds.
Throughout the photo shoot, Schargel wanders from the studio to the dressing room displaying items from her new lingerie collection for social attire.
She moves with ease in front of the lens of fashion photographer Pablo Saborido.
"I really like working with people who are a bit out of the model profile," admits Saborido, 39 years old.
Schargel defines her underwear as absurdly comfortable. "Some panties even help lift the bum bum," she slyly assures.
As the population ages, Ella Schargel thinks the world needs to prepare for that explosion of older women.
“In 20, 30 years, there will be many more grandmothers than young people. We need to prepare for that, companies need to prepare for that," she says.
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