NOT A HOTEL: Rethinking Hospitality for a New Era

Are hotels dying? Or are they merely sloughing off an old skin to expose something new?

The pandemic and subsequent economic hardship have unmistakably left their imprint – dozens of hotels shuttered, once-thriving lobbies now deserted, and time-tested hospitality models flipped on its head overnight. And the story concludes not in devastation but in revelation. If anything, these interruptions have forced the industry to deal with a braver reality: our expectations of travel and hospitality have changed.

Today, we don’t just seek a bed for the night; we look for connection, for experiences that feel personal and rooted in community. Hospitality has shifted from a purely transactional basis – payment for comfort and convenience – to an emotional and cultural transaction. Sociologists call this being part of a larger "experience economy", in which value is not found in the material but in the memory, the story, and feeling of belonging that travel creates.

Here, hotels are not just a place to rest; they're becoming social structures. People want to be a part of something local and authentic, whether it's sharing a meal with locals, attending a community workshop, or sleeping in rooms that embody the history of the neighborhood itself. The clinical homogeneity of chain hotels is being challenged by boutique hotels, co-living crossovers, and hospitality models focused on culture, health, and shared purpose.

This is a response to broader cultural changes: we are more and more in motion, linked to the world at large but yearning for a connection with place and with human beings in an era dominated by screens and algorithms. The post-pandemic traveler longs for intimacy, adaptability, and significance – much lacking in the standardization and utility of conventional hotels. The question is not whether or not hotels are dying but whether or not they are transforming beyond their previous functions into something new: community centers, cultural incubators, and human connectors.

Perhaps the evolution of hospitality lies in embracing the idea of being not a hotel – shedding the outdated connotations of uniformity and detachment tied to the very word itself.

“NOT A HOTEL offers exceptional homes, designed by exceptional creators, in exceptional locations. Our goal is to create a new standard for inspired living not found anywhere else in the world.”

– Shinji Hamauzu, CEO

This move away from being a hotel isn't abstract either-it is already happening. One from Japan that is certainly noticeable is the Japanese hospitality brand NOT A HOTEL. Its philosophy does well to turn the conventional idea of hospitality turned upside down: a home isn't simply a refuge, but a gateway to grow your world, to live more free, more imaginative, and more together.

Photos by Kenta Hasegawa

NOT A HOTEL takes the hassle out of home buying, from start to finish.

NOT A HOTEL constructs unique holiday homes that break down the line between personal home and thoughtfully designed travel experience. They are not way stations for faceless wanderers; they are spaces designed to be yours, but rooted in the richness of their location. Driven by cutting-edge technology and constructed with foresight for sustainability and innovation, these hotels offer a new holidaying experience – one where not just is a holiday home a destination but a way of life.

This Japanese approach taps into a broader trend: travel as belonging, rather than escape. With Japan already a global synonym for impeccable craftsmanship, innovative architecture, and deeply human-centered service, NOT A HOTEL builds on these strengths while adding flexibility and connectivity. The result is a hybrid space: private but sharable, local but global, technologically advanced but intensely personal.

What NOT A HOTEL and other brands of this sort illustrate, however, is that the future of hospitality may not be in building bigger hotels at all, but in creating new models of living – short- or long-term – that address our evolving needs for freedom, inspiration, and belonging.

NOT A HOTEL's vision is made tangible, physical, and architectural reality with NOT A HOTEL Setouchi, the newest project by the Japanese hospitality company in partnership with Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG). They are transplanting NOT A HOTEL's existing six locations across Japan to open a new hospitality hub on Sagi Island within the Seto Inland Sea.

"In partnering with BIG, we are creating one of Japan's most luxurious villas on Sag Island, which will be a gateway for more people to experience the charm of the Setouchi region."

– Shinji Hamauzu - CEO & Founder, NOT A HOTEL

Occupying 30,000 square meters on the island’s southwestern cape, NOT A HOTEL Setouchi consists of three villas – named 360, 270, and 180 for their panoramic perspectives – each designed to immerse visitors in nature and in the evolving dialogue between Japanese and Scandinavian design philosophies. This conversation is not new: when Japan opened its doors to foreign visitors in the 19th century, Scandinavian designers were at the forefront of borrowing from its aesthetic simplicity, natural materials, and profound regard for nature. This shared heritage is leveraged by the design of Setouchi, highlighting simplicity, landscape integration, and human contact with the environment.

The masterplan puts restoration front and center, moving olive and lemon groves, cutting the grass prior to building, and siting each villa along the existing roads and infrastructure to minimize disruption on the rolling hills. The result is an architecture that melts into the mountains and coastlines of the island – a ribbon of buildings gently unrolling over ridges.

All three villas reinterpret the traditional Japanese home for contemporary life. Their single-story layouts draw from vernacular domestic architecture, while materiality reflects local craftsmanship: curved clay walls built using traditional rammed earth techniques, slate floors patterned like tatami mats, and glass facades recalling the lightness of shoji screens. Interiors flow into large open spaces with functions neatly consolidated into “pods” – bathrooms, storage, and private areas – which are topped with skylights to maintain openness and access to daylight even in secluded corners.

"Our approach for this design aims to simultaneously expand and enhance the vast panoramic views of the archipelago while creating moments of intimacy and privacy through minimal architectural interventions. NOT A HOTEL Setouchi fuses the essence of BIG and modern Danish architecture with the DNA of NOT A HOTEL and traditional Japanese culture."

– Ryohei Koike - Associate, BIG

This project is what the future of hospitality could be: local in soul but global in vision, respectful of the earth yet embracing cutting-edge design and technology, personal yet profound in its conception of how we inhabit, travel, and relate.

Initiatives like NOT A HOTEL Setouchi foresee the hospitality of tomorrow no longer as a question of checking in and out, but of merging life, travel, and place into one seamless experience – one that honors tradition but reimagines how we live, even temporarily.

If home can now be anywhere, and anywhere can feel like home, do we even need hotels at all – or are we finally ready for something entirely new?

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Words: Simone Lorusso