Women in Sustainability Week

Pat Mitchell 

Pat Mitchell is a lifelong advocate for womenʼs leadership who has used her diverse spheres of influence to elevate womenʼs stories and representation and to lead for a more just, equitable and sustainable world. Currently, sheʼs the Co-Founder of Connected Women Leaders, a collective problem solving coalition, spanning geographies and generations and the Co Founder and Partner of Project Dandelion, a global women led campaign to unify, amplify and activate womenʼs leadership as a pivotal accelerator towards a climate safe future for all. She is also the Co-Founder and Editorial Director of TEDWomen. Mitchell’s influence extends far beyond her professional achievements. She serves on the boards of the Sundance Institute, The Skoll Foundation, The Woodruff Arts Center, The Carter Center Board of Councilors, and the VDAY movement to end violence against women. As a member of CARE’s Global Advisory Council and Chair Emeritus of the Women’s Media Center, which has established an annual award in her name, her commitment is to optimize every platform and every opportunity to elevate women’s stories, challenges and accomplishments. In her 2020 memoir. “Becoming a Dangerous Woman,” Mitchell calls on us to speak up, stand up and show up to meet the challenges of dangerous times.

Laura Turner Seydel

Laura Turner Seydel works with organizations that are solving the biggest existential threats facing humanity. Laura serves on the board for the Turner Foundation, the UN Foundation, Project Drawdown, Waterkeeper Alliance, Nuclear Threat Initiative and is a Patron of Nature with the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Chair Emeritus with the Captain Planet Foundation.  In the field of regenerative agriculture, Laura serves as an Executive Producer for the documentary film “Common Ground” and the soon to be released film “Groundswell.”

Vasser Seydel

Vasser Seydel is the President of The Oxygen Project, an organization on a mission to ignite a community of nature champions and accelerate collective action through campaigns, education and storytelling to create a conscious, regenerative and climate-resilient reality. She serves on the board of directors for Dr. Sylvia Earle’s, Mission Blue, the National Center of Family Philanthropy, and the Turner Foundation. Vasser is an Arctic Angel for Global Choices and serves on the Advisory Board for One Earth and the University of Georgia’s Sustainability Certificate.

Gay Browne

Gay Browne, CEO of Greenopia, is an environmental advisor and author of Living With A Green Heart: How to Keep Your Body, Your Home and the Planet Healthy in a Toxic World (April 2019), a roadmap for making incremental changes that will not only transform your life, but heal the world we share.

From the home to the office, from the foods we eat to the clothes we wear, Living With a Green Heart prescribes a set of simple, holistic steps you can take today that will improve your Personal Environmental Health, and help you stop feeling overwhelmed, reduce illness, improve sleep, mood, focus, and start making a difference.

She is also the Founder of Greenopia, a comprehensive guide to green businesses that takes the guesswork out of sustainability and helps people make healthy, green decisions in their everyday lives. Covering over 30 business categories—from restaurants to nail salons to burial services—Greenopia launched as a print series in major U.S. cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York before expanding online. In 2025, it will re-launch with a membership-based directory, mobile app, financial tracker, and green rewards program. Greenopia evaluates businesses based on life cycle analysis, social responsibility, and environmental impact to help consumers make informed, sustainable choices.

Gay’s green journey was inspired by her own health challenges. As a former asthma sufferer, she began to search for ways to improve her family’s living environment, and in 1994, she constructed the first green home in Pacific Palisades. In sourcing and working with contractors, interior designers, and furniture dealers, she soon realized that there was a wealth of green options, but no simple resource for locating them.

Her work has earned numerous honors, including the EPA Climate Protection Award and the Faith 2 Green Environmental Business of the Year award. In 2009, she spoke at the Green Inaugural Ball welcoming President Obama and Vice President Biden. She is a frequent media contributor, appearing in print, on radio, and on national television.

Gay lives in Santa Barbara. In her spare time, she enjoys hiking, tennis, golf, yoga, meditation, art restoration, writing, traveling, and spending time with good friends, her three children, and her grandson.

Sarah Livia Brightwood Szekely 

Sarah Livia Brightwood has been President of Rancho La Puerta for over 20 years, the pioneering 4,000-acre resort and spa founded in 1940 and located in Tecate, Baja California. For 30 years, Sarah designed the gardens and many buildings at the resort and created its organic farm and culinary center. She is a champion of regenerative, earth centered practices and a passionate steward of the land.

She has been President of Fundación La Puerta since 1996, a nonprofit serving the city of Tecate which created and maintains Parque del Profesor,  providing environmental education, wildland conservation and extensive programs for youth and families.  Twenty years ago Fundación La Puerta initiated a citywide campaign to rescue the Tecate River from being channeled in concrete and championed the development of the Tecate River Park.  The Tecate watershed continues to be a focus of Fundación La Puerta’s programming through city wide river clean ups spanning 20 years, curriculums and workshops on water and educational festivals such as Olipiaguas, a collaboration with the State Water Authority.  Currently, water treatment, water healing and reuse are part of the effort to restore the Tecate River and the watershed.

Chef Sheyla Alvarado

Acclaimed chef Sheyla Alvarado of Lunario restaurant in Baja California’s Valle de Guadalupe brings her “honest commitment to low cuisine” to Rancho La Puerta’s Women in Sustainability Week. Seeking out the finest and freshest ingredients from organic farmers and other sustainable sources that honor terroir and seasons, chef Alvarado has led Lunario to remarkable acclaim.

Her cooking has been mentioned by the American Culinary Institute, Condé Nast, and The New York Times. Lunario entered Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants list at number 54, and was awarded a Green Star by the Michelin Guide in 2024.

Sheyla Alvarado is from the state of Sonora, Mexico. After studying Gastronomy at the Autonomous University of Baja California, she did her internships at Cosme Restaurant in New York, Sud777 in Mexico City, and Mirazur on the French Riviera.

At Rancho La Puerta, she will welcome guests to several hands-on class sessions at La Cocina Que Canta, located in the midst of the resort’s 6-acre organic farm, as well as taking the helm for a Women in Sustainability Week celebratory dinner.

Amber Rubarth

Amber Rubarth made her acting debut starring alongside Joe Purdy in the feature film AMERICAN FOLK (out now on Amazon) winning numerous festivals and awards and being called “Superb… A heartfelt homage to American folk music,” by HOLLYWOOD REPORTER, and “Two wondrous new voices steeped in the folk tradition,” by ROLLING STONE.  She has scored and composed for many films including Sundance Film Festival winner ‘Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work’ and the award-winning documentary ‘Desert Runners,’ and recently co-produced a double album of 24 artists for the documentary ‘Fantastic Fungi.’  Her latest album COVER CROP is a meditation on sustainability and interconnectivity through the lens of 15 cover songs self-produced and recorded at her cottage in the woods of the Hudson Valley, New York.

– Official website:  https://www.amberrubarth.com/
– IG: @AmberRubarth
– Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AmberRubarthMusic/
– Youtube video: https://youtu.be/7CIeq-EK3gg?si=7UKmPDqV_08z8K4G