Cooper Hewitt says...
Ivy Ross, the daughter of an industrial engineer, was born in Yonkers, New York in 1955. She studied at New York City's High School of Art and Design, and later at Syracuse University School of Design and the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she focused on jewelry design. After creating her own jewelry design business in 1978, called Small Wonders, she entered the corporate commercial world, working at several companies in design and product development, including eyewear companies. She went on to graduate from the Harvard Business School in 1994 after completing the Professional Management Development Program. She is currently Google's Vice President, Head of Design/User Experience for all Hardware Products.
As a jeweler, Ross was one of the first designers to pioneer the uses of titanium, tantalum, and niobium, exploring their unique properties of color when electrically charged. In collaboration with Robert Ebendorf, she developed a product called ColorCore for Formica. Her work has been exhibited globally and resides in the collections of several museums. Ross considers jewelry as "art with a function," and is a champion of the crossover between wearable art and technology.
