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Reimagining Hospitality Through Regeneration and Place Vitality

Professor Michail Toanoglou argues that hospitality must move beyond “low-impact” sustainability toward regenerative hospitality that actively strengthens the vitality of places: their ecosystems, cultures, communities, and economies. He lays out a new value architecture and six executive priorities for hotel leaders to embed systems thinking and place-based reciprocity into strategy.

By Michail Toanoglou, PMP Professor & Academic Director MSc Hospitality Management, ESSEC Business School, ESSEC IMHI

From Harm Reduction to Healing: Why True Hospitality Must Become Regenerative

Glenn Mandziuk argues that hospitality must evolve from “doing less harm” to actively regenerating the ecosystems and communities it depends on. Building on the World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance’s Pathway to Net Positive Hospitality and shared data platforms like Vera-FY, he calls for accountable, place-based leadership and cross-industry collaboration that leaves destinations measurably better than we found them. 

By Glenn Mandziuk, President & CEO, Sustainable Hospitality Alliance

Leapfrogging Regeneration

Dominic Paul Dubois argues that truly regenerative hospitality is a journey, not a label you can jump to because the word is fashionable. Using a luxury alpine resort as an example, it outlines three non-negotiable “inner development” stages, showing how each step must be in place before a property can credibly claim to benefit its community and environment more than it harms them.

By Dominic Paul Dubois, Director of Sustainability, Six Senses Crans-Montana, IHG

The Forgotten Poison: Detoxing the Guest Room is Hospitality's #1 Regenerative Act

By Martim Gois, CEO and Co-Founder, Valpas

Food and Beverage, a drain on resources or a regenerative lever?

Adam and Bumjoo Maclennan argue that food & beverage is not a low-margin nuisance but the beating heart – and biggest lever – of regenerative hospitality. By shifting sourcing toward regenerative agriculture, empowering chefs as tastemakers, and designing menus that prioritise soil health, biodiversity, and zero waste, hotels can turn every meal into a catalyst for healthier ecosystems, communities, and guests.

By Bumjoo Maclennan and Adam Maclennan

Nothing we do is sustainable. Can everything we do be regenerative?

Architect Francesco Allaix argues that in a world where six of nine planetary boundaries are already exceeded, sustainability alone is no longer enough – and even leading pioneers like Patagonia admit that “nothing we do is sustainable.” Drawing on regenerative principles, Doughnut Economics, and Studio Puisto projects in Lapland and Cyprus, he shows how adaptive reuse, ecosystem restoration, and data-driven design can nudge hospitality away from extractive models toward more regenerative practice, even if perfection remains out of reach.

By Francesco Allaix, Architect, project manager, Studio Puisto, Studio Puisto Architects Ltd

Regenerative foodservice: from soil health to menu design

Carlos Martin-Rios reframes foodservice as a powerful lever for regeneration, shifting the focus from “less harm” to actively improving soil health, water cycles, biodiversity, and community resilience. He shows how procurement, menu design, pricing, and kitchen operations can be redesigned around regenerative agriculture and outcome-based measurement, turning restaurants and hotels into stewards of living food systems rather than endpoints of an extractive chain.

By Carlos Martin-Rios, Associate Professor of Management, EHL

The Designer's Responsibility in Regenerative Travel

Graeme Labe and Micayla Freeman argue that regenerative hospitality demands a fundamental shift in how designers see their role: from minimising impact to actively strengthening the living systems of place. Through examples from South Africa and Mexico, it shows how context-responsive architecture, local materials, and craft-based renewal can tie guest experience to long-term stewardship rather than one-off “sustainable” gestures.

By Micayla Freeman and Graeme Labe

The Circular Prerequisite: Why Regeneration Without Circularity Is Just Greenwashing

Manuel Maqueda argues that “regenerative” hospitality is meaningless – and often pure greenwashing – if it is built on a linear “take–make–waste” model. He outlines a three-step journey from efficiency (doing things right) to circularity (designing out waste and toxicity) to true regeneration (actively restoring ecosystems and communities), warning that you cannot skip the circular step and still claim to heal.

By Manuel Maqueda, CEO, Bionomia Institute

My journey toward regenerative futures

Martin Hohn reflects on a personal journey from traditional hospitality management toward regeneration, arguing that sustainability has been diluted and cannot succeed as long as infinite economic growth clashes with planetary boundaries. Regeneration is framed not as a technological fix but as a social and mindset shift: a place-based, whole-systems approach that reconnects hospitality with life, community, and ecosystem health.

By Martin Hohn, Founder, ATMA.life

Regenerative Hospitality leading the way: From possibility to practice

Nicola Gryczka Kirsch argues that regenerative hospitality is no longer an abstract ideal but a lived reality in places like Ibiti Projeto in Brazil, where tourism is designed as infrastructure for land restoration, community vitality, and long-term stewardship. Using the Lausanne Manifesto for Regenerative Hospitality as a compass, it shows how shifting mindsets, systems thinking and co-creation can turn hotels from extractive businesses into catalysts for thriving territories.

By Nicola Gryczka Kirsch, EHL Entrepreneur in Residence and Founder of The Regen Studio, EHL

The Regenerative Question: What Hospitality Must Become

Dr Anne-Kathrin Zschiegner argues that the real shift hospitality needs is not from “sustainability” to “regeneration” as buzzwords, but from short-term optimisation to long-term contribution to ecosystems, communities, culture, and commerce. Regenerative hospitality is framed as a collective, long-horizon practice that embraces complexity, openly navigates trade-offs, uses standards and technology as tools, and puts responsibility and long-term outcomes at the centre of leadership.

By Dr. Anne-Kathrin Zschiegner, Executive Director, The Long Run

Regenerative Tourism: Needs Protection

Harold Goodwin warns that “regenerative tourism” is rapidly becoming the next vague sustainability label, used in marketing without standards and ripe for greenwashing. He argues that true regenerative tourism is simply the pinnacle of Responsible Tourism: delivering demonstrable, positive economic, social and environmental impact for residents first, not just better experiences for visitors. 

By Harold Goodwin, Founder, ICRT Global; Professor Emeritus, Manchester Metropolitan University & Senior Fellow, Institute of Place Management, ICRT Global

On the peril of wasting a metacrisis

This article warns that tourism has already “wasted” one historic crisis (Covid-19) and is in danger of wasting a much bigger one: the current metacrisis of ecological collapse, geopolitical instability, and social rupture. Anna Pollock argues that mainstream tourism is still clinging to volume-driven, extractive growth and cosmetic “net positive” claims, while true regeneration requires a 100% shift in purpose – from mass industrial tourism to hospitality that helps hospice the dying system and midwife new, life-aligned ways of travelling, hosting and relating to place.

By Anna Polock, Founder, Conscious.Travel

The Regenerative Question - Who We Choose to Become

At its root, hospitality means something simple: to receive a stranger with generosity, to share what you have—food, shelter, warmth, knowledge—and in doing so, strengthen bonds of trust and reciprocity. It creates mutually rewarding relationships between humans and towards the place; ultimately it fosters conditions for life to flourish, deepens human connection, and leaves all parties enriched.

By Alessandro Inversini, Carlos Martin-Rios, and Willy Legrand

Six Senses The Palm, Dubai Opens Reservations

Six Senses has opened reservations for Six Senses The Palm, Dubai. Stays are available to book from September 1, 2026, ahead of the brand’s arrival in the United Arab Emirates.

Six Senses

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

New Jumeirah Campaign Illuminates the Beauty of Arabian Hospitality in Cinematic Tribute

The 90-second film features Emirati poet Shamma Al Bastaki and director Emmanuel Adjei, using light as a metaphor across Jumeirah's global portfolio.

Jumeirah

United Arab Emirates

Palladium Hotel Group Signs an Agreement with the Tourism Development Fund (TDF) to Advance its Expansion in Saudi Arabia

The Spanish hotel group will explore development opportunities in Jeddah and Yanbu as part of its 13-property expansion plan through 2028.

Palladium Hotel Group and TDF

Saudi Arabia