Hotels have mastered the guest journey. What about the value hidden in their interiors?

Part 1

One of the hospitality industry's greatest achievements over the past decades has been its ability to understand, map and continuously improve the guest journey. From the moment a potential guest discovers a property online until long after check-out, countless interactions are carefully considered and refined. Booking platforms are optimised, arrival experiences are orchestrated, guest feedback is analysed and every touchpoint is evaluated through the lens of experience and value creation. Hospitality professionals have become exceptionally skilled at understanding how value is created during a guest's stay and how seemingly small interventions can influence perception, satisfaction and loyalty.

What is striking, however, is that far less attention has traditionally been paid to another category of assets that contributes significantly to that same guest experience. Furniture, lighting, textiles and interior finishes shape first impressions, reinforce brand identity and influence how a space is experienced, yet their story often receives surprisingly little attention once they leave the building. While hotels have become increasingly sophisticated at extracting value from these assets during their years of use, considerably less thought is generally given to what happens when a renovation takes place and those same assets are removed.

The blind spot in hospitality design

For many years this was hardly considered problematic. Hotels renovate. Concepts evolve. Guest expectations shift. Furniture is replaced. New interiors are installed. The cycle repeats itself. The end of a renovation project was largely seen as the natural conclusion of an object's role within that specific context.

Yet several developments suggest that this seemingly straightforward logic may be entering a period of transition.

Guests are becoming increasingly attentive to sustainability claims and are demanding greater transparency from the brands they engage with. Environmental communication is coming under greater scrutiny, particularly as European legislation raises the bar for substantiated sustainability claims. At the same time, designers are rethinking products in terms of repairability, adaptability and future reuse, while emerging technologies such as Digital Product Passports are creating entirely new possibilities for documenting products and materials throughout their lifecycle.

Individually, these developments may appear unrelated. Together, however, they point towards a broader shift in thinking. Increasingly, the conversation is moving away from ownership and replacement and towards stewardship, continuity and value preservation. In this context, stewardship is not about keeping products forever. It is about recognising that value does not automatically disappear when ownership changes, a renovation takes place or an object moves to a different context.

What makes this particularly interesting is that the hospitality sector is uniquely positioned to lead that transition. Few industries renovate as frequently, refresh concepts as regularly or manage such large volumes of furniture and interior assets throughout the lifespan of a building. If there is one sector capable of demonstrating how value can be maintained beyond a single use cycle, it is hospitality.

Why greet hotels is more interesting than it looks

One of the most compelling examples can be found within greet hotels, part of the Accor group. On the surface, greet is often described as a hospitality concept that incorporates reused furniture and repurposed objects into its interiors. While that description is accurate, it arguably misses the more interesting story.

The real innovation is not that greet uses second-hand furniture.

The real innovation is that greet has stopped treating previous lives as something that needs to be hidden.

For decades, many hospitality environments have associated quality with newness. Pristine finishes, untouched materials and perfectly matched interiors became visual shorthand for professionalism and comfort. Any visible trace of previous use was often perceived as something that diminished value.

Greet quietly challenges that assumption.

Instead of asking how effectively the past can be erased, it asks whether the past might actually contribute to character. A reused object is not presented as a compromise or a budget decision. It becomes part of the narrative of the space. Previous contexts, previous uses and previous stories are allowed to remain visible.

That may sound like a subtle distinction, but it reflects a much broader cultural shift. Increasingly, guests are responding positively to authenticity, transparency and spaces that feel layered rather than manufactured. Sustainability is no longer confined to operational metrics hidden in annual reports. It is becoming part of the guest experience itself.

Designing for relevance rather than longevity

A similar shift was visible during Clerkenwell Design Week 2026, where conversations around circularity increasingly moved beyond recycled content and material selection. Designers and manufacturers spoke extensively about repairability, disassembly and adaptability, but what connected many of these discussions was a growing interest in a concept that receives surprisingly little attention: relevance.

For years, sustainability conversations have focused on longevity. How do we make products last longer? How do we reduce waste? How do we improve durability?

These remain important questions, but they are not the whole story.

After all, products rarely disappear because they stop functioning. More often, they disappear because the context around them changes. A hotel repositions itself. A brand evolves. An interior concept is refreshed. A building changes ownership. What becomes obsolete is often not the object itself, but the relationship between the object and the place in which it exists.

This distinction is crucial because it shifts the focus from designing products that merely survive to designing products that remain relevant. Repairability matters because it extends usefulness. Adaptability matters because it allows products to fit new circumstances. Disassembly matters because it creates future options. In each case, the objective is not simply longevity, but the ability to continue creating value under changing conditions.

Seen through that lens, circularity becomes less about extending lifespans and more about extending relevance.

What if value doesn't end at check-out?

This is perhaps where the hospitality sector becomes particularly interesting.

Hotels have become remarkably effective at creating value while furniture, lighting and interior elements remain inside a building. Those assets help shape guest experiences, reinforce brand identity and contribute to the overall perception of a property. Yet once a renovation begins, much of the conversation still revolves around replacement rather than continuation.

The emerging circular economy invites us to ask a different question.

What if the end of a project's relationship with an object does not automatically represent the end of that object's value?

A chair may leave a hotel lobby while retaining its functional value. A table may leave a restaurant while retaining its aesthetic value. A lighting fixture may leave a project while retaining both its material and economic value. In some cases, those forms of value may even increase when they find a new context in which to operate.

The implication is significant. If value can survive beyond ownership, then the challenge facing hospitality is no longer limited to creating value during the lifespan of an interior. The challenge becomes understanding how value can be preserved, transferred and reactivated beyond that first context.

And perhaps that is where the next chapter of hospitality design begins. Not with the question of what we buy, but with the question of what happens after we no longer need it.

Image credits: Photo by Chaz McGregor on Unsplash