Welcome to Strategy Sessions by Crown Creative, where we share our hot takes on the latest happenings in the world of hospitality, hotels, and food & beverage. In each session, we’ll share a new collection of insight and inspiration, giving you a peek behind the curtain to the research and strategy that informs our work every day.
We’re sharing our ins and outs for the year ahead. What’s trending in, what’s fizzling out, and what’s getting us excited for another monumental year of design…
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Tableside theatrics
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We are absolutely loving the return de force of martini carts, whiskey carts, dessert carts, tableside caesars and all those extra, old-school service theatrics we sorely missed after too many years of QR code menus. By all means, bring the bar to me while I sink into my corner booth.
This is one of our favorite trends to work with clients on. From the martini cart and ice cream giveaways at a swanky all-day eatery in Detroit, to the tableside parmesan wheel pasta and flaming desserts at a luxury resort in Northern Italy, we’re constantly dreaming up new ways to bring theater and action to our client’s restaurants.
Image: Tableside Steak Tartare at Maison Francois Restaurant.
Work from anywhere
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Surprising to absolutely no one, the work-from-anywhere trend shows no signs of slowing down. According to Forbes, in 2023, 12.7% of full-time employees worked from home, while 28.2% worked a hybrid model. By 2025, 32.6 million Americans will work remote, which equates to about 22% of the workforce. This opens up a new landscape of “bleisure” travel (business + leisure, of course), as workers not only work from their home or local cafe, but increasingly on the road – and hospitality has to adapt, with even stronger WiFi, sexier all-day spaces, and smoother day-to-night transitions.
Over the past year, several of our projects have focused on blurring the lines between home and hospitality. In many ways, that blurring effect is what defines the “lifestyle” hotel sector – and this year we worked intimately with a global hotel brand to create their own guardrails around lifestyle branding. We also designed five different food and beverage outlets for a new luxury hotel opening in Greece, with a heavy emphasis on communal and flexible spaces. And, we’re revamping a hotel in our backyard of Belfast to include a new members-only Club experience and co-working space.
Image: The Library at The Malin New York.
In-room autonomy
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As much as travelers crave connection and community, they also want their alone time. This trend dovetails with the work from anywhere revolution – as more travelers hit the road for everyday excursions, they want and expect their everyday creature comforts.
That means workout equipment in-room (like Westin’s in-room Pelotons); spa services that come to you (like the Highacre ensuite spa); and well-stocked in-room bars with cocktail fixings, pour-over coffee equipment, and more. This presents an exciting design challenge to make hotel experiences truly feel like a home away from home.
We’re enacting this with a Belfast luxury hotel client, whose well-stocked private suites are designed to feel more like true apartments than hotel rooms – equipped with a stocked kitchen, bar, listening library, and more.
Image: The Regency, Belfast
Contrast therapy
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No pain no gain, so they say. We have to admit we’re intrigued by the new era of wellness that’s all about subjecting your body to extreme environments. Gone are the days of the relaxing oil massage. Nay. Give me a bathtub full of ice, a blazing hot confined space, and a yoga mat outfitted with spikes and I’m in heaven. It turns out that opposites don’t just attract, they also have physiological benefits – wet and dry, hot and cold – the sauna, steam room, and cold plunge are becoming tablestakes for a modern spa experience, The spa is not only becoming more extreme, but also becoming more social – even a place to bring clients and colleagues. The Equinox hotel is mastering this evolution by recognizing that high performing creatives and executives are endurance athletes in their own right, and there’s a genuine market for cutting-edge wellness that challenges the mind, body and spirit.
For several of our clients, offering a spa experience that’s more than just a menu of massages, but rather provides a more holistic wellness experience, is crucial. We help design each touchpoint for them, from the brand identity to the food & beverage offering and beyond, to help make sure they’re on the cutting edge of health.
Image: Eynsham Baths at Estelle Manor
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Savory cocktails
Cocktails are beginning to sound like meals in themselves, with increasingly savory ingredients. Forget an absinthe rinse, these days it’s all about fat-washing and seasoning drinks.
Check out inventions like ‘Second Wind’ at The Dead Rabbit - made with Irish Poitín, Sweet Potato & Cedar Wood or Double Chicken Please’s drink ‘Cold Pizza’ which is inspired by margarita pizza and the iconic margarita. The cocktail features cheese and burnt toast tequila, lime-basil cordial, oolong tea honey, tomato water, and egg white.
While the gimmicky nature of these might border on obnoxious, we have tried them and they’re pretty amazing. And while they may not be quite as adventurous, we’re in the process of designing a cocktail menu for a select service hotel group that is equally as fun – leveraging canned cocktails, beers and wines with fully loaded garnishes that border on the extreme.
Image: Second Wind at The Dead Rabbit, NYC
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TikTok trendiness
Critics claim that TikTok and Instagram are creating a tyranny of aesthetics, wherein only the things that are popular get more popular, and everything starts to look the same.
Welcome to Filterworld.
Unfortunately, we tend to agree – over the past several years we’ve witnessed a sanitation of taste that seems to reward uniformity, not uniqueness. The ubiquitous Scandinavian-minimalist-coffee-shop is the quintessential case study here, often incited by critics, since you can find it quite literally anywhere: New York, Milan, Tokyo, Mexico City, you name it.
Against these odds, our challenge is to preserve individuality, creativity and bravery in design, TikTok ratings be damned!
Image: TikTok Trends
D2C only
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The past decade or so has seen a meteoric rise in direct-to-consumer food brands (and everything brands), but recently we’ve noticed these brands creeping from our browsers and onto our shelves.
High-aesthetic mini retailers like Pop Up Grocer, Foxtrot, and others now offer curated selections of these TikTok and Instagram-born brands out in the wild – from Graza to Omsom and beyond.
Turns out, retail isn’t dead after all…
We’re currently designing a cafe brand that will live in the lobby of a major hotel network, and we’ve been inspired by this trend to incorporate more of an ‘epicurean market’ feel to the experience, complete with all those adorable CPG products that make you have pantry envy.
Image: Pop Up Grocer NYC
The era of Beyond and Impossible started to wane last year, and we saw increased interest in going plant-based the old-fashioned way – by eating… plants.
Although these new analogue products play an important role in the modern food system, their shiny allure on menus is wearing off, and we expect to see a distinctly more natural approach to meat alternatives (like the Veggie Shack), no fake bloodiness required.
Image: Beyond Meat Burger
Fake meat
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Contactless tech
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After several painful years of contactless technology creeping into every corner of the hospitality industry – from kiosk check-ins to QR-code menus – we welcome a return to a human touch.
While we’re certainly advocates for convenience, we’re also suckers for creative, tangible moments of surprise & delight that a screen simply can’t achieve.
More warm cookies at check-in, please…
The only contactless tech we’ll admit – the new age call button, like at San Francisco's Holbrook House, where guests can flip a literal switch at their table to cue their server to bring fresh champagne or martinis.
Image: Champagne Switch at Holbrook House, SF
Airline first class
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Forget getting price-gouged for a first-class flight – the new luxury way to travel is on the rails (unless you’re flying StarLux). We’re experiencing a train travel revival, and luxury train experiences are reaching new heights of extravagance and popularity.
Inspired by a mix of environmentalism, a desire to go off the beaten path, and a growing interest in deeper immersion into the culture and landscapes of a location – train travel is poised to make a great comeback, and we’re here for it. Planes, useful and necessary as they may be, have become horribly utilitarian, characterized by cramping, chaos, delays, hidden fees, and sometimes even missing doors.
In contrast, getting from A to B on these remerging train experiences is all about the journey, not just the destination. There’s a reason the Orient Express has been running for 150 years.
Keep an eye out for Canada’s Rocky Mountaineer, India’s Maharajas Express, and a return of the epic Eastern & Oriental Express in Southeast Asia for your next luxury getaway.
Image: Royal Scotsman Train Carriage
