Rosalía Mera

Mera left school at eleven to work as a seamstress in A Coruña, met Amancio Ortega at a shirtmaker's and co-founded the business that became Zara with him in 1975, working on its early production and workshops. After their divorce she kept a stake in Inditex that made her Spain's richest woman, and she used it to back a pharmaceutical group and a foundation for people with disabilities. Credit for Zara usually goes only to Ortega; it should not.