skopology.com

Business model:
Home decor eCommerce and science artist partners
Each item is curated by Dr. Ahna Skop (a geneticist) that remind her of something in science, including many items in biology, medical fields, chemistry, math, tech or engineering!  Primarily we are doing lighting and home decor items. But the potential is there to expand much further. Future goal to be similar to Saatchi Art where we promote up and coming science artists (which we are doing now) but I would like to expand this similar to what Saatchi is doing online.

Products:
We source home decor right now on Aliexpress and our science art is one of a kind sourced directly from the science artists themselves.  Each item is carefully curated by Dr. Ahna Skop (who is the owner and famous scientist/artist). The description of each item has links to Wikipedia that reveals to the customer what this item looks like in science. Each customer can learn the science behind each piece.

We would like eventually to have a brick and mortar store(s) across the country. We see huge potential for stores that not only sell items but teach the public about science. The spaces could be a mashup of a science museum with an art gallery concept, with spaces for events, etc. The stores could be like little science art galleries/museums.

More importantly we give back to programs that support underrepresented students and STEAM outreach. 

Our goal is to not only sell things, but to have the public to learn more about science and appreciate all of the beauty that it has to offer.  We have enormous reach on Pinterest (397K month alone), I'm looking for investors to help me launch my business further, as this is a side hustle for me (Ahna) as a professor of genetics.  I need more people to help me manage and promote the business given the immense potential given our analytics.

Customers are primarily from the USA right now.

Team:  3 sisters
Dr. Ahna Skop (geneticist/science artist at UW-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin)
Tarsia Mah (designer, Los Angeles)
Zesha Skop (marketing guru, San Diego)

We have now joined up together to create collections of scientific art inspired home goods with the goal of inserting science art design in everyone's lives. 

We started skopology to bring science art design to the masses. Science and art should be in your everyday!

What is your founding story? When we started skopology, we knew it was about so much more than home decor. We wanted to create a place that brought people together to celebrate science, art and design. We want science to be a part of everyone’s lives, including home decor and design. We hope in time to branch out to other types of products in the near future with goals to host science artists work on our site.

What are your values and mission? At skopology, our mission is to find products that celebrate the beauty of science and also highlighting science artists from all over the world. We also are dedicated to giving back to STEM diversity and STEAM outreach programs for K-12 students. 

We donate part of our proceeds to STEM/STEAM organizations!
We look for partners who are making change in STEM or STEAM fields, with focus on STEM diversity. Our most recent charity partner was SACNAS, an inclusive organization dedicated to fostering the success of underrepresented people in STEM, from college students to professionals, in attaining advanced degrees, careers, and positions of leadership in STEM.

What does your name mean? We started skopology to reflect the world of science art. SKOP is our last name. skopology is the branch of science art knowledge that runs through our veins as scientists, artists, marketing gurus, and graphic designers.

Ahna Skop is a geneticist, artist, authors, and a winner of the prestigious Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Her lab seeks to understand the molecular mechanisms that underlie cell division during embryonic development using the nematode, C. elegans as a model system. Failures in cell division often lead to birth defects, cancer, and age-related neurodegenerative diseases. Understanding how cells divide is highly dependent on in vivo microscopy and large amounts of visual data, which dovetails perfectly with one of her other passions, art. The combination of scientist and artist inspires her to think differently and maintain an open mind. Some of her work can be seen in the main entrance of the Genetics/Biotechnology Center building on the UW-Madison campus with a 40ft-scientific art piece called “Genetic Reflections”.  She has also curated and contributed to a traveling exhibition of scientific art called “TINY: Art from microscopes” from the UW-Madison campus, and she has organized the bi-annual Worm Art Show for the International C. elegans Meeting for over 24 years. Ahna is also passionate about increasing the numbers of underrepresented students in STE(A)M fields. In 2016, she was awarded the very first of two, Chancellor’s Inclusive Excellence Award for her outreach and inclusive teaching efforts. She has served as a board member for SACNAS (Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science) and currently serves on the ASCB (American Association for Cell Biologists) Minority Affairs Committee where she has broadened her impact on underrepresented students in science nationally. Her recent book, “Genetic Reflections”, showcases the beauty of genetics, model organism biology, and DNA. 

 

Ahna is the child of artists. Her father, Michael Skop, was a bit of a Renaissance man and was a classically trained fine artist who studied with Mestrovic (a pupil of Rodin) and also taught college-level anatomy. Her father operated an art school at their home studio for over 30 years and attracted artists, musicians, and philosophers from all over the world. Her mother was a high school art educator, ceramicist, and has dabbled in fiber art, sculpture and painting. Her two sisters and brother are also graphic and industrial designers. She has embraced her parents’ love of creativity in everything she does. She majored in biology and ceramics at Syracuse University (1990-1994), where her father had played football and studied with Mestrovic. She received her Ph.D. in Cell and Molecular Biology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1994-2000) and conducted her post-doctoral work at UC-Berkeley (2000-2003). 

 

Ahna is a Professor in the Department of Genetics and an affiliate faculty member in Life Sciences Communication and the UW-Madison Arts Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She mentors both scientists and art students in her lab, and also serves on the board of the Wisconsin Science Museum, where many of her art-science collaborations are on display. In 2008, she was awarded an honorary doctorate of science from the College of St. Benedicts and was named a Remarkable Women in Science from the AAAS. In 2015, she was honored as a Kavli Fellow from the National Academy of Sciences. In 2018, she was awarded the first ever Inclusive Excellence Award by the ASCB and HHMI. She currently serves as an advisor to the chief diversity officer at the NIH (Dr. Hannah Valantine), on the ASCB Minority Affairs Committee, and is a diversity consultant to the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI). In 2019, she was honored as one of 125 Women in STEM with a AAAS IF/THEN Ambassadorship. In 2020, she published a book with her two talented undergraduates called “Genetic Reflections: A Coloring Book”. Her science and art have been featured by Apple, The Scientist, USA Today, Smithsonian, PBS.org, NPR and Science magazine.