Samantha Wood is a women’s contemporary cocktail and bridal event dress brand, recognized online as @thedressdesigner and known for versatile little lace dresses.
What began as a Project Runway–style side project evolved when Samantha struggled to find the perfect white party dresses for her own wedding events. Everything felt too fancy, too trend-driven, or not made to actually move in. That gap inspired the launch of her Little Lace Dress Collection—designed for women who want to feel confident, comfortable, and subtly alluring. Each style is made from exclusively designed stretch lace and buttery-soft linings, meant to be dressed up or down and worn well beyond a single occasion.
A lifelong maker, Samantha grew up sewing in the Washington, D.C. area and later studied Apparel Product Development & Merchandising at Virginia Tech, earning Best New Designer and Best Designer during her time there. After college, she moved to New York City, where she built a well-established career spanning design, buying, product development, and marketing—bringing sketches to life for established designers, merchandising for top U.S. retailers, and leading campaigns for major brands. Throughout, she continued designing custom dresses and refining her aesthetic. Her work spans brands including Hearst, Shoshanna, PVH, Estée Lauder Companies, St. Jude, Bosch, Thermador, and Gaggenau, as well as national retailers like Macy’s, Costco, Home Depot, and Lowe’s.
Today, Samantha leads the brand full time from her design studio in Charlotte, North Carolina, with CFDA-trusted partners in New York City and Los Angeles. Her team continues to create timeless dresses that blur the line between bridal and ready-to-wear, celebrating modern femininity without sacrificing comfort.
