Knowledge?

Creativity?

Hospitality?

Innovation?

Aesthetics?

Service?

Knowledge? Creativity? Hospitality? Innovation? Aesthetics? Service?

Hospitality Design

At this point, you might expect a grand introduction to Michel Brokke, his insights, and why the end of times is upon us if you miss them. But this is not about Michel.

Michel writes, speaks, and meets people with an interest in hospitality. In all of this, he quietly returns to what matters most: design.

Safe is risky

Your researcher on the ground observes where good design hides in hotels, restaurants and other places of belonging. Through plain observation and gentle irony, he reminds us that creating such caring spaces and human services requires spectacular failure. Again and again.

Read why failure is a good thing

After meeting Michel, some people run away, while others stay. Both are fine. He doesn’t give answers. Instead, he questions your assumptions about spatial and service design.

Spatial design includes topics such as heritage development, sonic branding, cultural storytelling, scent development, biophilic design and privacy gradients.

Service design includes topics such as guest journey design, service rituals, community cultivation, social choreography, table culture and micro-personalisation.

Meet Michel yourself

Who would not want to be creative? To design new guest experiences or, for that matter, invent a new way of tying one’s shoelaces? Michel’s articles and lectures invite you to look closely, think a little harder, and realise that brainstorming is about as effective as a car wash in autumn.

Spoiler alert: “those who seek, shall not find.”

Michel writes about anyone attempting to create beauty in hospitality, heroes and losers alike. Some may find answers here, most will leave with more questions.
Ideas and “Eureka moments” are often sharper when seen from the outside. With that in mind, Michel guides the design of hospitality spaces and services, with the aim of breaking through the assumptions that keep participants knee-deep in the swamp of design and innovation.
Michel explores the world’s best and worst hotels, the importance of design, and the oddities of hospitality. He often concludes with a reminder that we roam the earth without any grand purpose or meaning, which, oddly enough, can be rather encouraging for design.

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Rather run the show yourself? Read more about hospitality design.

Read Michel’s Articles

What on earth is hospitality design?

Hospitality design is the complex simplicity of creating places of belonging. Where market-driven innovation responds to demand, design-driven innovation rests on a more radical premise: that the meaning of spaces and services might be otherwise. Creativity acts as a compass, while failures are merely side roads along a muddy path through science, art and philosophy.

More about hospitality design

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