Carlos Usabiaga López is a Spanish-born, New York-based curator and scholar whose research explores the expression and reception of national identity through fashion. He holds a Master’s degree in Art History Research from Utrecht University in the Netherlands and undergraduate degrees in Humanities and Translation and Interpreting from Universidad Pablo de Olavide in Spain. Carlos is currently a PhD candidate and Curatorial Assistant at Bard Graduate Center.

His previous professional experience includes the Kunstmuseum Den Haag, where he co-curated the exhibition Royals and Rebels: British Fashion; OMA, where he worked as an Archive and Collections assistant for architect Rem Koolhaas in Rotterdam; Modemuseum Hasselt, where he collaborated as an assistant curator for the exhibition M/Others. Fashion and Motherhood; Museo del Traje in Madrid and, most recently, Director María Nicanor’s Office at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York.

His Master’s thesis, titled The Mantilla of Empress Eugénie: Interlacing Identities, focused on Empress Eugénie de Montijo’s navigation of her dual national Spanish and French identities, specifically through her import of the Spanish mantilla to Second Empire France. He contributed an essay on this subject for the catalogue of the exhibition La Moda en la Casa de Alba, for Fundación Casa de Alba. Carlos has expanded on this research for his role as guest curator for the exhibition Mantilla: Fashion Unveiled at the Hispanic Society Museum and Library in New York, opening in November 2026.

Carlos has presented his work internationally, including at Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne and the Festival de l’Histoire de l’Art at the Château de Fontainebleau, and was selected as part of the 2025 cohort of ¨30 under 30 Next Generation of Cultural Leaders¨ by Communicating the Arts.