Leonisa

Four brothers of the Urrea Urrea family founded Leonisa, the Colombian lingerie and shapewear manufacturer, in Medellin on November 20, 1956. Its name is a contraction of Lencerias Nacionales de Textiles S.A., and it now sells bras, shapewear, swimwear and men's underwear through stores, catalog agents and online shops in a dozen countries, with factories in Colombia and Costa Rica.

From a Shop Called El Volga

The Urrea brothers, Luis Enrique, Marco Aurelio, Joaquin Eduardo and Julio Ernesto, came from Guatape in Antioquia. In 1950 the family moved south to Armenia, in the coffee-growing Viejo Caldas region, to ride the coffee boom, and the brothers opened a store there called El Volga. It did well at first. Conditions in the region then deteriorated, and the family went back to Antioquia.

Leonisa was the second attempt, and it started small. Spanish-language accounts describe the brothers' first equipment as a single serger and a flat-bed sewing machine. Their first products were general garments: shirts, slips and petticoats. Then they narrowed the focus to women's underwear and produced a bra called Diamond Point, and from that point the company presented itself as one of the first real makers of women's intimate apparel in South America.

Costa Rica, 1965

Medellin was Colombia's textile city, and Leonisa used it as a base for export earlier than most of its neighbors. In 1965 it built a manufacturing plant in Costa Rica to supply Central America, nine years after the company was founded. Men's underwear followed in 1975 under the name Airell; that line was renamed Leo in the 1980s and still trades under that name.

Europe came in 1989, starting with Spain, then the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Italy. Swimwear was added in the 1990s.

The Magic Up Bra and the Catalog, 1993

The year 1993 changed how Leonisa sold as well as what it sold. It launched the Magic Up, a padded lifting bra in the push-up bra family, presented as a technical product at a moment when the push-up was the most fought-over item in the lingerie business. In the same year it set up a catalog sales channel: independent sellers taking orders from printed catalogs, the method used by beauty companies across Latin America. That channel now runs in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Spain, Colombia, Peru, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Chile, Guatemala and Puerto Rico.

Catalog selling suits shapewear in particular. A seller who knows the customer can recommend a compression level and a size, which matters more for a firm body shaper than for a cotton brief.

Colombian Shapewear on a Global Shelf

Shapewear, called fajas in Colombia, is a large domestic industry, and Leonisa is its best-known exporter. The current catalog sorts shapers by the area they target and by compression level, and it carries named lines such as SmartShape, Boldly, Airlift for butt-lifting shorts, InvisiPlunge for backless shaping and the PowerStay slip short. There is a bridal range and a medical category alongside the fashion pieces. In practice this puts Leonisa in direct competition with American labels such as Spanx in the US market.

Earlier versions of this article credited Leonisa with a proprietary compression fabric called DuraFit. That name does not appear in the company's current product range or in the sources reviewed, so it has been dropped.

Online, 2009

Leonisa opened its online store in June 2009, first for the United States and Canada. E-commerce now covers more than 12 countries and ships to over 120. Retail shops operate in the US, Spain, Portugal, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Panama and Puerto Rico.

Since 2005 the company has also run breast cancer awareness campaigns with health organizations, including educational brigades and a mobile app promoting early detection.

Leonisa by the Numbers

Item	Figure
Founded	November 20, 1956, Medellin
Founders	Four Urrea Urrea brothers
Second plant	Costa Rica, 1965
Europe	From 1989, starting in Spain
Revenue, 2023	About 812 billion Colombian pesos
Employees, 2023	About 10,000

Ten thousand employees is a long way from one serger and one flat-bed machine, and the company is still run from Medellin.

Last updated October 7, 2026