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Crises often test the foundations of every life. Some retreat, others break, and a few choose to resist creatively. In those uncertain months of confinement during the Covid pandemic, When the whole world seemed frozen, Aello Lescano found in the unexpected a door to the new. Together with his father, for whom life had always provided a silent bridge, he decided to turn uncertainty into a driving force. literally.
The project began in the back of his house, with a parked long-distance bus. While many counted the days on crossed-out calendars, they indulged in improvised tools, wood and plans. Every screw they tightened was also a way to keep their eyes on the future. It was the birth of a project that was encouraged to give a second life to heavy vehicles by converting them into homes on wheels.
“I didn’t build my first motorhome until the pandemic arrived in Argentina. We built our first Gigi motorhome with my dad in the middle of quarantine. “It was our first job together and his first paying job.”Aiello recalls. “I had just graduated and couldn’t find work specifically because of quarantine, so I joined in making this mobile home for a family friend. I fell in love with the process, the tools, and the construction.”
This transition from academic to manual was not easy. Go from hours writing at the desk to spending full days in the workshop, From literary theories to saws and screwdrivers. “The first months were not easy. I moved from the world of letters to the world of crafts, from theory to practicality. From sitting at a desk to standing all day at work.
At first I ended up being very tired because I wasn’t used to it, but I loved learning something new every day, and even more so with my parents.
Isolation, for many, was synonymous with loneliness, for them The opportunity to work side by side. Between sandpaper and electric saws, Aiello discovered that what she had learned as a child – resisting bullying, standing firm in the face of rejection – was now invaluable capital. He learned to use tools, got frustrated, and started over. He was encouraged to show each step on social networks, thus also finding an audience willing to accompany the process.
The first completed mobile home was a kind of statement: it was possible to reinvent itself even in the silence of empty streets. It was possible to turn adversity into a journey towards another way of life.
Aiello’s story cannot be told without going back to those childhood years in which life tested her early. He was born into a family of entrepreneurs, characterized by a culture of effort. His parents worked long hours, and during his early years he lived with his grandmother, so her death left a void that was difficult to fill. “I had a completely quiet and normal childhood until then, when I was 6 or 7 years old,” he points out. “My parents are entrepreneurs and they raised me in a culture of effort: Since I was very young, they always took me to work in their stores. “I have seen first-hand the ups and downs of entrepreneurship and the sacrifices they make every day.” School was no refuge either: she suffered constant bullying in both primary and secondary school, and dual-education days that forced her to spend almost the entire day in a hostile environment. “My teenage period was a bit complicated. I felt very lonely after my grandmother died and I was in an environment that did not make me happy at all.”He explains.
And in the midst of that ordeal, there was a bright respite. His father, a genius and adventurer, decided to build the first family mobile home. “At that time, my father built the first mobile home for family travel,” he says. “We traveled with my parents and brothers to Chile, Bolivia, Peru, Uruguay and toured all over Argentina. We bought magnets for every place we visited and filled the entire refrigerator in our mobile home with them.”
He even took all of his mobile home mates to the zoo for a birthday. At a time when traveling on wheels was not common in Argentina, for her it became a natural way to live in the world. “At that time, step-living was not common here,” he recalls. But it’s impossible not to fall in love with motorhomes, as travel is beautiful and it’s possible to create memories like this.
My adolescence was mixed with silence and loneliness, but also with the certainty that I would not give in to pressures to fit in. “I was always a good student and stayed true to myself,” she says. “I tried to ignore my classmates’ comments instead of trying to fit in. I think it’s the same today but on the internet, and I think the bullying in some way prepared me for that.” He hates Popular in today’s digital media.” And it would be this same spirit, years later, that would allow it to transform again in the face of the unexpected challenge of the pandemic.
Gigi Motorhomes was born in a backyard, but has grown at the pace of trust and demand. After the first bus, a bus arrived, then a minivan. Space became insufficient, and the family made a radical decision: sell their house and choose their own warehouse in Tigre. “So we went from 200 square meters to 1,000 square metres,” Aiello recalls. Today they work on vehicles owned by customers seeking to transform them into nomadic homes: each one is handcrafted, personalized, and can require up to a year of work. “Right now, we have a closed schedule because we are working on the reconversions we previously agreed upon while we work to build out a charter fleet,” he explains.
The road was not free of obstacles. Aiello had to face masculinity and humiliation in a male-dominated industry. “I have been doing this trade for five years and they still want to teach me how to do things just because I am a woman,” she confirms. “There are many gender stereotypes in the construction world.” But instead of hiding her femininity, she chose to embrace it. “I try to make it an advantage to be a woman in an industry where men are usually the heroes: I know that’s eye-catching, and I try to use that to our advantage to promote our project. I even exaggerate: I make my nails more and more eye-catching, and I always use a bow in my hair.”
In addition to personal requests, the company is preparing to launch its own fleet of vehicles for rental. The idea is Open the experience to those who dream of traveling on wheels without having to buy or convert a car.
According to Aylú, when choosing a mobile home for rent, it is useful to consider some key aspects: “The most important thing when choosing a car is the number of people who will be traveling.” -Warning-. While a van generally seats two or three people, a long-distance bus can accommodate up to eight people. The distances to be traveled can also be a factor to take into consideration.
He explains that the most common mistake is choosing a vehicle that is too large. Without obtaining professional registration or experience in managing those dimensions. “Most mobile homes, such as those built on vehicles such as a bus or coach, require professional registration – he points out -. However, the opposite mistake one can make is to choose a vehicle that is too small and does not suit the needs of the family.”
His business is in full expansion: workshops, online courses, consulting, social networks that never stop growing and joint projects with companies. “The main thing that will come is the rental service. We are already working on the first fleet product on a vehicle that was previously school transportation. It will be for four or five people and we are very excited.
On that journey, Aiello always comes back to the same image: That girl who looked out the window of a mobile home her father built. In a way, that postcard brought him back to life. Only now have I also become part of those who turn the key and set dreams in motion.