The Lobby 002

The era of the tastemaker

Mar 28, 2026

Dear guest,

I have been going to lymphatic drainage yoga twice a week, and let me tell you, it gets the juices flowing. Here I present to you my thoughts about current industry (adjacent) news that were revealed to me in savasana.

Welcome to The Lobby_, a roundup of what’s happening in hospitality, served with a point of view.

In this letter: engineering is out tastemaking is in, more fashion entrants into hospitality, spot the difference Noma/Hell’s Kitchen, and the Hollywood stamp of approval on hospitality being the last luxury.

Snapchat CEO says marketing will be more important than engineering. We have moved to a level of maturation with AI that I can personally fw. As a storyteller, a writer, (and a philosopher, if you will), I feel validated by Evan Spiegel’s recent declaration that now that AI (instead of a roomful of super smart people) can build anything, the best story is what will move the needle going forward. We have heard a similar sentiment from OpenAI's Greg Brockman, who said that taste is now the ultimate differentiator. All of this is great news for hospitality, or rather, potentially great news that can only be realized with investing into narrative and emotional resonance and atmosphere that are so intrinsic to the industry. His exact words here.
Cult brand Chrome Hearts enters hospitality. The luxury label known for emo silver work and trashing the hotel room energy (and just to be clear, we are a fan of this at tPH) has acquired the Surfrider Hotel in Malibu. The design is bespoke and true to the brand, incorporating silver hardware and the brand’s own furniture. I love when so many of my intuitions just keep manifesting. We’re seeing fashion continuing to bet on hospitality, and not just legacy maisons, but what the cool kids are wearing!!! I’m so proud I could shed a tear. Moreover, we have some experiential retail going on with an in-hotel private boutique selling exclusive pieces only available to guests.
Ms. Bella Hadid in a Chrome Hearts robe
Oscars gift bags this year were hospitality galore. This year’s Oscars nominee gift bags were valued at $346,000, of which physical items made up $6,000. The rest is luxury villa stays in Costa Rica, Ibiza, and Finnish Lapland (shoutout to Hideout Villas), a ten-day wellness reset in Sri Lanka, and to my amusement, liposuction and a custom prenuptial agreement. This means that $200,000 of the bag’s value is hospitality experiences. I can tell you two things 1) I need to get nominated at the Oscars pronto 2) the scale tipping so heavily into experiences over products tells us a lot about what is seen as valuable in 2026. Mind you, the recipients are A-list celebrities and the most luxe thing they can be offered is the cultural capital brought about by niche hospitality experiences.
Noma’s René Redzepi exposed for years of physical abuse. The New York Times just published an investigation interviewing 35 former Noma employees documenting physical and verbal abuse by founding chef René Redzepi from 2009 to 2017. One gory story involved Redzepi ordering his entire kitchen staff outside during a dinner rush to witness him assault a sous-chef. The news involve one of the world’s most celebrated restaurants, essentially the poster child for culinary innovation, and has sparked interesting conversations on restaurant-stack (read this, this, and this).
Hospitality is starting to get more cultural visibility. We have had hit shows like the Bear and White Lotus. But cultural visibility does not come without accountability. When hospitality enters the zeitgeist, there will be scrutiny and questioning. This is good, and consider me sat.
I wanted to hear the thoughts of my friend who has worked as a chef at Michelin-starred restaurants, and here’s what he said:
My chef friend’s thoughts on the Noma situation
What bamboozled me to the core is what he mentioned about the now-deleted comments on Noma’s page where some people are essentially justifying the abuse that takes place in high-end kitchens. One comment said:
“I feel like a lot of people in the comments have never worked in kitchens, and if they have, not at the level noma used to operate. If you did you would see that all of those actions and decisions made noma what it is. The work is relentless. You need to be strong, mentally and physically. You need to be dedicated. This is the choice you make when being the best, and I respect it.”
Like my friend said, the sentiment is far from ideal, but at least we have arrived at some collective awareness.

In short, there are many signals from unprecedented directions pointing to hospitality, be it restaurants or hotels, becoming recognized for the cultural capital the industry carries.
That said, with more awareness comes difficult but very necessary conversations. The hospitality industry is for instance notorious for high employee turnover rates, and hopefully, some deserved public scrutiny will finally instigate some real change.

Phewww that was a bit heavy. I think we need to wind down by the nightstand.

Sharing what I'm reading, watching, or listening to; hospitality-related or not.

In the last edition of the Lobby, I did a roundup of my some hospitality literature that I have on my to-be-read list. But I have taken a little detour to familiarize myself with Rick Rubin’s work. Rubin has worked with (and this is not an exaggeration) everyone in the music industry, from Paul McCartney to Jay-Z.

rick rubin — The absolute #SWAG of this guy I mean…

His 2023 book titled The Creative Act is a collection of his musings about creativity, how it’s innate to being human, how we are not really owners of our ideas but vessels for a greater force that is the actual source of everything we create.

The Creative Act: A Way of Being [Book] — I love a good textured hard cover. Taking this as inspo for the tPH book.

So I have highlighted the hell out of this book because I feel like it’s so metaphorical to hospitality. You know how great service can feel almost magical, creating an atmosphere of its own? I think that happens when hospitality professionals tap into a source larger than themselves; they are in service of something greater than this one person alone.

If you have read the book I would love to hear your thoughts.