What’s Ahead for 2025: Differentiation as Experience
Our desire to form deeper connections is reshaping travel. Here are a few trends we’re keen on for the year ahead.
From trips inspired by your latest fantasy read or the latest season of White Lotus, to luxury trains that transport you back in time or meals that take you off the grid, leisure travelers are seeking experiences that foster wellbeing, a sense of belonging, and are driven by a spirit of discovery.
In recent years, immersive stays like Amangiri, Blackberry Farms, The Lodge at Blue Sky, and Pendry Natirar have proven that you don’t have to be in a destination city to create a destination experience. Travelers are embracing the spirit of off-the-beaten-path discovery, finding smaller, lesser-known destinations to get a more immersive, authentic experience. Boutique hotels like White Water in Cambria or Cuyama Buckhorn in New Cuyama offer an alternative to nearby Santa Cruz and Santa Barbara. Trailborn has established independent hospitality in smaller destinations like Estes Park, CO and Highlands, NC. And Urban Cowboy found wild success with their location in New York’s Catskills. Detour destinations are delivering on the authentic experience we're craving.
There’s nothing quite like a one-time-only, exclusive-feeling event to generate excitement, foot traffic, and buzz online while reinforcing your hotel’s brand promise in your community. From the Oscar-Meyer Truck to the Cronut craze, the food & beverage scene has been leveraging the power of pop-ups for years, why shouldn't hotel's benefit too? Atop New York’s McKittrick Hotel, Gallow Green transforms its rooftop to become The Hideout for the winter season. SoFar Sounds brings local music to hotels like Denver’s CatBird and Chelsea’s Hotel Americano. These limited-time immersive experiences are a powerful tool to engage customers and bring relevancy to hospitality spaces, not to mention attract people who might not typically visit your property.
In a world increasingly dominated by digital interactions, travel offers the perfect antidote to the burnout of endless swiping and shallow online interactions. Brands like Outsite and The Social Hub provide built-in community to solo travelers. Timeleft is a friendship app that is used by travelers to have dinner with five strangers with shared interest each Wednesday across 60 countries. Influencers from BookTok to FitTok are using TrovaTrip to launch trips where strangers travel together over a shared interest. Solo travel is becoming social, acknowledging the power of togetherness.
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We’ve got a lot on our minds. The uncertainty of global unrest, an unstable administration, and the emergence of AI, to name a few. Travelers are embracing nostalgia, whether through design or details, to tap into the feelings of safety when things were simpler, happier. Design trends are embracing the primaries. Movie nights of familiar favorites. A resurgence of reboots. Summer camps for adults. We’re looking to the past for comfort from our present.
The gig economy wave that surged following the ‘great resignation’ has made us realize we do enjoy learning new skills and empowering our own independence. More and more, travelers are looking to learn from their trip or leave with a new skill, nearly 80%, in fact. From rural upskilling with hotels like Babylonstoren or Viceroy Ombria Algarve (where you can step into the rhythm of rural life and join a local shepherd and artisanal cheesemaker to learn his craft) to educational trips with Road Scholar, travelers are looking to leave better than when they arrived.
With Instagram as the top source for travel inspiration for GenZ, a picture is truly worth a thousand words. Companies like Opulist curate aesthetic-driven travel recommendations. And even Vogue is naming their most anticipated hotel openings for the year. But good design goes beyond aesthetic, it tells a story. Every design choice — whether it’s the color palette, furniture or artwork — presents an opportunity to reinforce a narrative and drive differentiation from every other well-designed hotel. Lido House’s architecture reinforces their brand as “your local beach house,” while The Colony Hotel’s handpainted de Gournay wallpaper features flora and fauna indigenous to South Florida. As the lifestyle hotel market gets more and more crowded, keep an eye out for hyper-local stories told through design that create immersive, only-here vibes.
In the first month of 2025 a 6.4-magnitude earthquake struck southern Taiwan, a tropical cyclone passed over Madagascar, and Los Angeles was set ablaze by wildfires. Sustainability is no longer a buzzword, it’s table stakes. Platforms like Kind Traveler and Fairbnb promote properties that prioritize social impact and authentic guest experiences. Restaurants are embracing climate sourcing to consider the impact of their sourcing practices. A new hotel in Denver, Populus, takes their food waste from their two restaurants and processes it in an on-site BioGreen360 biodigester, with the resulting fertilizer delivered to local farms. MUSA in Guerrero, Mexico, has a commitment to source all materials, food, and labor from a 100km radius of the property. Travelers are more aware of the impact of their dollar and are looking to spend their money on things that leave a positive impact, not a detrimental one.
Maslow has entered the chat. As the luxury market has grown (forecasted to surpass the $1 trillion mark by 2027) opulence and white-glove service have been traded in for intimate backdrops where life can unfold and experiences that offer connection to something bigger than oneself. Brands like Six Senses are pioneering holistic wellness travel through personalized services that foster mental, spiritual and physical well-being. she she in Mallorca, Spain offers a multi-sensory travel experience interweaving movement, slowness, and new ways of thinking. CLO Circle, a philosophy club fosters the exchange of thoughts, feelings, and ideas. ZihFit is an entire resort dedicated to profound personal change. “Luxury is not about material things anymore–it’s a feeling, about being able to enjoy, relax and feel secure.” Ian Schrager
Cookie-cutter no more, the industry of lifestyle, boutique, and independent hospitality is headed out-of-the-box. Travelers are craving connection, originality, and impact. It’s teeing up to be an exciting year and we can’t wait to watch it unfold!
