Shapewear Designed for Women, By Women

Don’t Settle For Less

I walk into Anna’s home to sit down and do this interview with both her and her mother Annette, who is visiting from Sweden, and I realize, in honor of full transparency, I may have taken a bit more time standing in front of the mirror to make sure my outfit was as stylish as I could make it. I wore pins from my collection, such as my Clockwork Orange one, and my Ska pin, even my Dia de Los Muertos pin was perfectly in place. I had a cool necklace for contrast, and of course, my Legnology tights, 200 denir, pulled up and right where they should be. Just one look at these two women and they inspire you to be creative. It’s an incredible talent I’m not sure they even know they posses. Up until this point, I have only known Anna for a couple years as a member of they gym I train at, and her mother I’ve only known through social media pictures. However, our collaboration and agreeance in this coming together was natural, a ‘of course’ moment, a free flowing movement of like minds supporting each other.

 

Welcome To Legnology

 

A hosiery line, created in 2012, that focuses on quality, fit, and the sustainability of their surrounding environment. Their mission is to provide a product of such great substance that it fills an actual void in a woman’s life that she wasn’t aware she had before. As someone who has personally worn their product both in her wedding and her everyday life, I will go behind the scenes to provide you all with this incredibly rad story of two amazing women, like the cool kids you wish you were friends with, and describe the empowerment of their vision coming together.

 

---How did this company start?

      As they look at each other to see who would answer first, you can immediately see the admiration Anna has for her mom

Annette:

“I worked in the industry for over 25 years, quality control, in the buying office, buying socks and ladies tights,  after 25 years I wanted to do something else, but when I quit, I did not know what i wanted to do… I knew I needed to take time off to really figure it out, what to do next. Next thing I knew, people started to just call me, people i didn't even know, designers, suppliers even.”

 

--- Because of the long relationships you built up over the years?

      Annette answers, “ yes, just those relationships I had built over the years.”

      Anna chimes in with, “oh mom, don't be so humble!”

      She then looks at me, making sure I’m listening,  “they called her because they were like, ‘please don't quit!’”

 

--- Annette was really searching to find something that fit her talents, fit her need to produce high quality products for women, funny enough, this super amazing woman is an educated men’s tailor! She has vast knowledge in all sorts of fabrics, fibers, production and style.

 

--Was this something you always wanted to do?

 

   “I mean, not at first, I did enjoy my job, I had always been working with clothing, sewing and such, but when I was asked what I wanted to do, where I wanted to go from there, I said, ‘teach me something new! I want to learn more.’ I had always just worked with clothing.

So they put me in the hosiery department. They told me they needed a buyer for the department.  It was a very small department, trying to learn what products were like being 100% polyamide, like the things you can buy at the food store today. I was really nervous, I didn't have clue, in fact I  thought for sure in 3 months they would kick me out, knowing I knew nothing about what I was doing. How hard can it be to make a pair of tights? That’s not so complicated! I found out, I had never been so wrong in my whole life.  But, I really started to learn, to catch on, and see how the production of how it all worked. You know, at that time when I started, 99% of all the producers were all men! Can you imagine?”

 

---The production of all the hosiery she was watching being made was such an exact science, that truly when you think about it, as the average consumer, we do not really think about what we are buying. We don’t really fully grasp what goes into the clothing we buy, or even the dedication to knowing each and every single component. Meanwhile, Annette had a chance to look behind the scenes and see these ingredients, yes, ingredients that were going into this product!!

 

Anna continues--

     “Panty hose can never be organic, never. It’s raw oil, that’s where it comes from.”

 

---It takes a lot of water, energy, some chemicals to take the steps needed to get even the fibers needed for the hosiery. Plus, it’s a whole other process to give the nylon fibers their qualities. From this, you make lycra and so on, you can get specific.

 

“We believe that sustainable production is about the whole chain. From fiber, through production to finished product.”

-- Legnology

 

--- I proceed from here to tell these beautiful ladies about my encounters with an entire market who have no clue who they are or what their product is all about. I tell them that everytime I try to explain to others what Legnology is all about as well as what they are, almost every time someone will respond with, “oh, like spanx?” I ask them if they ever run into this during their advertising.

 

   “We never want to talk about other brands because we want to grow honestly. However, spanx to us are more like an underwear. That just isn’t us, we are everyday-wear.”

 

---We all then discuss that most women in the United States and Canada don't really have a product with this type of high quality ingenuity or recognize the care it takes to create a pair of Legnology, that honestly women just don’t know what they are missing out on. Now we’re getting somewhere. Our mission with this collaboration here at The Knockout Collective, is to open the eyes of the average American or Canadian woman to the product they didn’t even know they needed in their lives! The ladies of Legnology wanted to create a product of such high caliber that women would want to wear these every day.

 

“In our opinion (call us crazy) once you put your tights on, they should stay in place and be comfortable.”

--Legnology

 

Anna, in a very honest moment recounts a few customers commenting on the pricing of them, but confidently, without any hesitation encourages them to try it knowing they will not regret any of it. And she says she is always right. Each customer that has these reservations comes back with a resounding, praiseful report. Annette tells me that she knew that when she set out with Anna to do something different, they knew that first and foremost they wanted to do something, make something that they needed for themselves as well.

 

Then the most amazing part of the interview happens, in my opinion at least. Anna refers to her mother as the pile of leaves from Fraggle Rock!! That took the exact right turn at the exact right time. She was searching for the word ‘guru’ when referring to her mother, yet this piece of gold came out instead. If you don’t know Fraggle Rock, first of all I’m sorry you did not have a proper childhood, second, the piles of leaves are called Gorg’s, self proclaimed rulers of the universe. When lost in their lives, the Fraggles would visit the Gorg’s for guidance. The translation was not lost on me, and I am forever grateful that that happened the way it did. This is the very sentiment you feel radiating from Annette from first impression. Calm, sure of herself, wise and knowing. A ‘come and sit and listen to my knowledge’ air about her, although, she is so far from acting in this way. A trait she has clearly passed to her daughter for sure.

 

The arc of the transition is truly a beautiful one. The transition they made from working for others, to eventually being entrepreneurs is an amazing story, that of careful thought, a feeling of being called to action and answering that call rather than ignoring it, then when it came time to move, they jumped in without hesitation knowing they were onto something. Their visions were in alignment. Starting a full two years before Annette said enough was enough, she questioned everything, gained zero popularity amongst her colleagues knowing she was stirring the male dominated pot, she then eventually told her boss that she could no longer stand behind the product. So, she quit.

 

-----What would be something that you two would say to a woman perhaps in your position? Maybe a woman who feels very strongly that she has an idea, something that could help others or change the course of many things, but is not quite sure of what her next step should be. What advice would you both give her?

 

       “Number one, you have to have a business plan. A solid business plan allows to project you out in the future. What is your vision? But also, never, never, never underestimate your gut feeling. Sometimes, honestly to be an entrepreneur, you have to be a little bit stupid. It's like having a baby, it’s never the right time. We never regret one single decision we made. A good business relationship, a good one, is when both parties or all parties involved feel like they’ve done something good. No one should feel like they’ve won anything.”

 

“I’d rather get old, and regret what I did, than what I didn’t do.” -Annette

 

This intensely fierce pair taught me so much in the span of about 20 mins.

 

---Finally, we talk about why they decided to use the everyday woman on their boxes rather than models. They both decided that they wanted to use women who would be the customer. They knew they didn’t want to market to an unrealistic audience.

                

“We don’t stand on our knees in a g-string and high heels, well, most days. You want to be able to relate to what you’re buying, someone who looks like she could be you.”

 

--- So, they used friends, exactly how we started at The Knockout Collective.

 

How can one capture pure awesomeness in one interview? It was so difficult and truly I have been so nervous about pushing forward with this in the ‘right’ way. Each word was needing to be carefully thought out, each adjective to portray this fantastic company needed to be above and beyond, and I had it in my head that failure was not an option. Why? What had I just learned, what had I just been privy to?

 

I had an insight to these two and their start up of their company and I had not put into action what they taught me. I learned that as a woman, I can research and stand strongly in my choices to go out and get it done. I felt honestly so much stronger as a woman in general walking out of there. That’s when I realized that this interview meant so much more than learning about how they started or more about their company.

 

I saw the exact reason why Hannah and I started The Knockout Collective. Our resilient ability as women to believe in something so much that we allow ourselves to push forward being a little stupid, knowing it’s never truly the right time, or even feeling that we want to only truly regret the things that we maybe at least tried and failed with good lessons to back them. Let us not ever regret what we didn’t do in life, as Annette taught me. SO, a big thank you to our ladies from Legnology. We are forever grateful to have you two bad ass ladies leading the way for so many others coming up behind you.

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Interviewed By: Emily Bishop 

Photography: Eric Spraker

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