Alessandra Wood headshot

Alessandra Wood

Adjunct Professor

Biography

Dr. Alessandra Wood is a design historian with an eye towards the future. She studied design history & theory and is obsessed with applying that knowledge to understand what makes products beautiful/useful/successful, and what inspires people to love those products. With expertise in scaling design processes, she has a refined eye for style, and strives to make art and design accessible to all. Her current role as VP of Style at Modsy has allowed her work on the compelling challenge of reimagining the way we design our homes.

Alessandra is the author of Designed to Sell: The Evolution of Modern Merchandising and Display (Routledge, 2020). With a PhD that focused on Design History and an M.A. in the History of Decorative Arts and Design, she has intense academic training in style, production, and consumption of furniture and decorative arts—a bona fide design expert, taught by the best of the best curators and historians.

In her spare time she is an adjunct professor at University of San Francisco and California College of the Arts.

Education

  • University of Delaware, PhD in American Civilization with a focus on Design History
  • Parsons, The New School for Design, MA in The History of Decorative and Design
  • The Johns Hopkins University, BA in The History of Art

Selected Publications

  • Designed to Sell: The Evolution of Modern Merchandising and Display (Routeledge, 2020)