Ashley Gill has been with Textile Exchange since 2010. She works in the Industry Integrity TEam to develop and manage the Textile Exchange-owned standards and to align the industry in issues dealing with verification of product claims related to sustainability. Ashley leads the International Working Groups for the recycled standards (RCS and GRS) and the Responsible Down Standard. She is responsible for Textile Exchange’s Standard Setting Policies, and she also does key outreach to support companies in their understanding and adoption of the standards.

Anne is the Director of Industry Integrity for Textile Exchange. She has worked on standard development, training and education on certification and transparency and is collaborating with other organizations and experts to continually increase the organic integrity of the cotton industry. She has over 15 years of experience working with retail, including 10 years as a product manager at Mountain Equipment Co-op where she converted their cotton program to organic. In 2005, she co-founded Continuum Textiles, a sales agency representing socially and environmentally responsible textile products.

Sevilla Granger has worked extensively in various aspects of the sustainable textile and creative fields in the US and Europe and has served on various international working groups such as the Sustainable Textiles Coalition and the Responsible Wool, Down and Leather Working Groups. Her commitment to sustainable textiles sprang from her undergraduate work at North Carolina State University, well known for its Textile program, where she received her degree in Environmental Design with a minor in Textiles. Her professional engagement with advancing sustainability in the industry gained traction during her work at William Sonoma and Gap, Inc. It was further refined with leading US home textile brand Coyuchi, where she lead the team to be the first GOTS certified home textiles brand, as well as achieving Fair Trade certification.

I’m an insatiably curious lifelong learner and a whirling dervish hula hoop phenom. I’m passionate about community, partnership, provenance, ethics, and timeless style. Through stories, I delight in making the complex simple. There’s nothing I like better than connecting in person, good old-fashioned “teeth and eyes time.”

My first job (not including babysitting and waitressing) was as the receptionist at Chanel HQ in Paris. It ignited my love affair with both product and fashion while elevating my commitment to service.

Since then, I’ve been….

• Marketing and Community Director and Entrepreneur in Residence, Brooklyn Fashion + Design Accelerator
• Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Brooklyn Fashion + Design Accelerator
• Regional Director, Green Festival –New York
• Co-Founder and EcoPreneur, RESTORE Clothing
• Co-Founder, NOCHAIRS, Inc.
• Founding Member, Save The Garment Center

La Rhea has an extensive background in the organic cotton agricultural sector as well as management and marketing. She is a 5th generation cotton farmer in Texas and her farm has been certified organic since 1991. She completed her BS in Education at Abilene Christian University in 1979 and Master of Business – Organizational Leadership in 2016. La Rhea was one of the co-founders of Organic Exchange and served as Chair of the Board until 2005 and then joined the Management TEam with the Exchange.

Evonne spent the past 20 years improving data and reporting for companies around the world. From a manufacturing background, she moved on to consultancy with PwC and IBM, project management with Wessex Water before settling into the sustainability sector with CSR Consultancy. A graphic designer on the side, Evonne is passionate about data visualization and using data to tell a story. 

Evonne started working with Textile Exchange in 2009, leading on data collection, analytics, reporting and consumer engagement. Currently, the Director of Data Management and China Strategy, Evonne holds two different portfolios in the company: one that focuses on creating value from data for textile sustainability and another to promote sustainable fiber and materials growth in the Chinese market. 

Liesl Truscott is European and Materials Strategy Director with responsibility for developing and embedding Textile Exchange’s preferred materials program. Liesl has specialized in organic cotton and has a deep knowledge of the sector. With a first class degree in Environmental Management from the University of Newcastle in Australia, she has spent over twenty years in the fields of corporate social responsibility, occupational health and safety, and environmental management – working in both the private and public sector.

Lee has been with Textile Exchange since 2008 and is primarily responsible for the consistent application of Textile Exchange standards by certified sites and certification bodies. This includes creating and maintaining an accreditation process, coordinating working groups, as well as providing guidance on the standards. He is also directly involved in the development and revision of standards and their supporting documentation. Additionally, Lee supports the financial and operational aspects of Textile Exchange. He holds a Master’s in Entrepreneurship, a Bachelor’s in Management, and a minor in Spanish from Texas Tech University.

Donna leads Textile Exchange’s Marketing Communications team to ensure all focus areas within the organization receive a high level of visibility through innovative strategies involving internal and external communication, branding, marketing and public relations. In addition to this, Donna is also responsible for the oversight of Textile Exchange’s global events to create greater visibility for Textile Exchange and to provide a space for industry engagement. Prior to joining Textile Exchange, Donna worked in Development and Public Relations for a higher education institution from which she earned a Bachelor’s degree in Organizational Leadership.

Contact Donna 

At Textile Exchange, Ryan focuses on strategy and operations as well as program development.  For strategy and operations, he ensures that Textile Exchange’s work is well-aligned, well-coordinated, and focused on achieving Textile Exchange’s mission and long term goals.  For program development, Ryan drives projects that support and enable Textile Exchange’s strategy and platforms.  Prior to joining Textile Exchange, Ryan led the development of the Higg Index 1.0 and 2.0 at the Sustainable Apparel Coalition.  He has also consulted on sustainability to leading apparel brands and retailers, as well as to sustainability-related mutli-stakeholder organizations.  Ryan started his sustainability career at Blu Skye Sustainability Consulting in 2008; prior to this, he developed a strong track record in general strategy and management consulting.  Ryan has a B.A. in economics from Cornell University, and an M.B.A. in strategic management and marketing from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Carlotta has a Master´s degree in Strategic Leadership towards Sustainability obtained at the Blekinge Institute of Technology of Karlskrona, Sweden. While writing her thesis on Slow Fashion, she acquired different skills and became a professional graphic recorder and a group facilitator.  Passionate about spreading awareness and knowledgeable about the best practices in the fashion industry, she also works as an educator in her community and collaborates with companies to help them identify the most efficient and rewarding path towards sustainability.

Brent Crossland is the past Head of Fiber Development for Bayer and is based in Valencia, California, U.S.A. He is an independent cotton sustainability consultant and Ambassador for The Textile Exchange. 

Brent has worked in the plant science industry for the past 37 years with experience in crop protection, product development and launch, seed production and the global textile supply chain.  He has held past positions with academia, independent consulting, product development and research and sales and marketing in the cotton industry.

Brent was instrumental in the development of the global Certified FiberMax traceability program.  He also developed and managed the e3 Sustainable Cotton Initiative. A very well-known expert on the cotton supply chain, Brent has presented globally on sustainable initiatives to many world cotton organizations.  He is a past recipient of the Bayer CropScience Luminary award for distinguished achievement and the “You Can’t Pick Better” award for initiatives in the cotton seed business.  In addition, Brent was also awarded the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Excellence from Texas A&M University.

Brent holds a Bachelor of Science Degree from Texas A&M University and a Master’s of Agriculture degree in Plant Science from West Texas A&M University. 

Atilla has been an Organic Pioneer in Turkey since 1986 and started growing organic cotton in 1989.  Since then he has been somewhere in organic cotton & textile as consultant, buyer, and project expert in SEA. Atiala’s path crossed with TE in 2010 and he has been trying to help in the Turkish organic cotton & textile sector on behalf of Textile Exchange as country ambassador.

Sandra Marquardt is the president of On the Mark Public Relations, which provides communications, advocacy, and research services on behalf of the organic and sustainable fiber and food sectors. Marquardt also is a special projects consultant to Textile Exchange and secretary of the Organic Trade Association’s (OTA) Fiber Council. Formerly, Marquardt was the Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS) representative in North America, serving to promote and protect the standard. She also developed and coordinated M+R Organics, a division of M+R Strategic Services focusing on organic fiber communications. Previously, she worked with the OTA and several leading environmental and organic organizations on domestic and international pesticide use policy.

Silvio studied agronomy at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, acquiring a master's degree in soil science and microbiology.  Still in college, he met the pioneer ecologist José Lutzenberger, with whom he began his professional career and has developed numerous projects in the field of sustainability. For over 25 years he develops consulting and audit activities for organic farming projects and environmental management systems for various companies in Latin America.

Silvère has been the Regional Director in Africa since 2006. Before joining Textile Exchange, he completed his PhD at Giessen University in Germany where he wrote a dissertation on “Gender perspectives in the adoption of organic cotton in Benin: a farm household modeling approach.” In Benin, he has been involved in many socioeconomic research programs tackling issues related to small scale farmers’ income and well-being. He joined OBEPAB (a Beninese NGO promoting organic farming) a member organization of the worldwide Pesticide Action Network (PAN) in 1998 where, for 4 years, he coordinated an information and training program on organic farming.

My name is Allen You. I come from the capital city of China, Beijing. I have more than 8 years of experience working in textile testing and the certification sector with local, international textile and agriculture organizations. He previously worked at Oeko-Tex, based in China, in TESTEX and Hohenstein, aiming at eco-textile idea promotion. During this period, I communicated with all kind of textile companies and buying offices in China and I know the China textile industry well. After that, I joined ECOCERT for organic cotton and the agriculture sector. Through visiting organic cotton farmers, I understand the organic cotton situation in China deeply, and am lucky to have been cooperating with TE from 2012. I am also working in the organic agriculture and textile industry in a local organization in China. 

A creative entrepreneur with a career background in consumer behavior, marketing communications and sustainability, Valentina is focused on creating collaboration within the industry in the aim of igniting innovation for positive social and environmental change. Her work with Textile Exchange as the local ambassador is focused on industry engagement, education and international collaboration to foster positive transformation within the textile supply chain.