Intentional Hybridity: Designing with Passion

Drawing on Kerten Hospitality’s methodology and case studies, Marloes Knippenberg shows how purpose led frameworks, deep local engagement, and embedded ESG can create scalable projects that stay authentic, coherent, and adaptive as guest expectations and societal demands evolve.

Everywhere I look, forces are colliding: digital vs. human, global vs. local, standardization vs. personalization, revenue vs. responsibility. By default, collision leads to friction, but only if we cling to the purity of one side over the other. I see far greater opportunity in intentionally fusing these forces, transforming tension into generative energy.

At Kerten Hospitality, we have been weaving together polarities since our foundation. Intentional hybridity is one of our guiding principles. What follows are reflections on what I’ve learned and how we put hybridity into practice in an age defined by convergence.

Read the full article

The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Annual Edition

The hotel industry in 2026 finds itself at the meeting point of powerful, converging forces: rapid technological progress, climate urgency, shifting guest expectations, labour market disruption and economic realignment. This edition of The HOTEL Yearbook looks at how hotel organisations respond, not by choosing one direction over another, but by designing integrated strategies that combine digital and human, global and local, automation and empathy. A large share of this year’s contributions focuses in particular on artificial intelligence and its growing influence across almost every segment of hospitality, confirming AI as one of the defining themes of this moment. Bringing together expert voices from around the world, the publication explores strategy, technology, sustainability, finance, asset management, food and beverage, human resources, design and more, all through the lens of intentional hybridity in an age of convergence. The message is clear: in 2026, hybridity is no longer optional; it is strategic, and it will be the leaders who approach it with real intention who shape the future of our industry.
www.hotelyearbook.com/edition/2026.html