Sandra Niessen
Kirsten Scott
Miguel Angel Gardetti
Sandra Niessen
PhD Leiden University, Netherlands (1985), she is a prominent scholar specializing in the clothing and textile traditions of the Batak people of North Sumatra, Indonesia—a subject on which she has authored four books and numerous articles, as well as produced two films. She taught at the University of Alberta for 15 years and has worked with numerous museums worldwide, conducting research, developing exhibitions, and documenting collections. A founding member of the Research Collective for Decoloniality and Fashion and Fashion Act Now, she is currently an activist working to dismantle the fashion industry.
Kirsten Scott
Dr. Kirsten Scott is Head of Research at the Istituto Marangoni London. Her research explores traditional ecological knowledge—both local and global—related to fashion and textiles as fundamental to reimagining sustainable clothing systems in the post-growth era.
She is the founder of the Barkcloth Research Network, a multidisciplinary research group comprising artists, environmentalists, farmers, scientists, and designers from the United Kingdom, the United States, and Uganda. Her PhD in Constructed Textiles (RCA) focused on the potential of local Ugandan natural fibers for sustainable product development and the co-creation of income-generating opportunities and training activities for women in a remote region of the country.
Miguel Ángel Gardetti
PhD and Master’s degree in Business Administration from IAE Business School (Universidad Austral, Argentina) and a Master’s degree in Environmental Studies and Sustainable Development from the Universidad de Ciencias Empresariales y Sociales (Argentina). In 2008, he founded the Sustainable Textile Center (Centro Textil Sustentable). He is a guest co-editor and author of various publications, including both academic journals and books (USA, UK). He has taught at several Latin American universities, training both faculty and students. In the field of decoloniality as it relates to fashion and design, he is a member of the Research Collective on Decoloniality & Fashion. Within that collective, he formalized the ABYA YALA Coalition (Abya-Yala.earth) and also founded the publishing imprint Otra-Otro (otra-otro.org).