I am a professor of Italian Studies and a cultural historian. I completed my undergraduate studies in Classics at the University of Milan. In 2005, I moved to the United States, where I specialized at Notre Dame (MA) and Harvard (PhD) on Italian modernist literature and early industrial culture.

​

My research and courses touch upon Italian literature of the 19th and 20th centuries; the intersection of arts & business; and the cultural history of industry, advertising, and design in Italy.

 

My books include a monograph on 20th century writer Italo Calvino (I passaggi obbligati di Italo Calvino, Longo 2017), an award-winning study on the origins of Italian design (The Art of Objects. The Birth of Italian Industrial Culture, 1878-1928, University of Toronto Press, 2018), a biography of chocolate entrepreneur Michele Ferrero (Il fabbricante di cioccolato. Nel mondo di Michele Ferrero, Piemme 2023), and a cultural history of the rise of American culture in Italy at the turn of the 20th century (The Rise of Americanism in Italy, 1888-1919, University of Toronto Press, 2025).

​

My work for the Italian Innovators project has been featured in national Italian media (La Stampa, Sole 24 ore, Canale 5) and I have been invited as business mentor and guest speaker at numerous academic and corporate venues.

​