Hybrid hospitality: What offices can learn from hotels and third places

While many hotels today offer multifunctional rooms, restaurants, conference areas or bars and thus see themselves as hybrid concepts, hybrid hospitality goes much further. It is not just about mixing uses, but about a deep understanding of human needs: belonging, encounter, comfort and meaning. A place that embodies hybrid hospitality offers a holistic experience – regardless of whether someone stays for a day, a week or a month.

For companies and designers of modern office environments, this raises the question: what can offices learn from these hospitality role models? The answer can be found in two impressive examples, each of which shows in its own way how spaces can shape community and enhance productive work.

What began as an idea for a better student hotel has developed into a European success story and symbol of hybrid hospitality: The Social Hub (TSH). Founder Charlie MacGregor's vision was to give young people a place where they could feel at home, grow and shape their future. But over the years, the student hotel has become a lively, inclusive hybrid space where a wide variety of lifestyles intersect.

TSH combines under one roof:

• Hotel rooms for short-stay travellers
• Coliving for long-term guests
• Coworking for start-ups, digital nomads and creative types
• Community spaces for workshops, sports, culture and cuisine

The result: a melting pot of students, locals, entrepreneurs, travellers and creative types that facilitates genuine, everyday encounters. This "complete connected community" is no accident – it has been deliberately designed. The spaces promote exchange, openness and a sense of being part of something bigger.

The growing digital economy has shown that people benefit enormously from physical proximity to other innovative minds. TSH has recognised this and created professional coworking areas that enable focus or collaboration depending on the mood of the day – a principle that is also essential in modern office environments.

With the TSH Talent Foundation, founded in 2024, the company is setting an example: 1% of annual revenue goes towards scholarship programmes for underrepresented students. This approach shows how Hybrid Hospitality not only designs spaces, but can also have a social impact.

TSH also goes beyond its own buildings: in Italy, two large public parks were opened in 2025 – true urban oases that actively involve neighbourhoods. The message: hospitality means strengthening community – in the building and far beyond.

Townplace West Kowloon shows a completely different, maximally futuristic facet of hybrid hospitality. As a new aparthotel in trendy West Kowloon, it combines serviced living with a flexible lifestyle offering for young professionals, digital nomads and long-term guests.

Covering around 34,750 m², it combines:

• fully equipped co-working spaces
• community terraces & social areas
• sports & wellness areas
• event rooms, kitchen areas and outdoor areas
• smart studio flats and 3-room apartments

The architectural openness is particularly fascinating: sightlines connect the gym, pool, coworking space and terraces – a spatial expression of the basic idea of connecting people across activities.

The division into different atmospheres – green zone, industrial loft, gaming area – creates spaces for concentrated work, lively meetings or relaxed socialising. The Flavour Lounge with communal kitchens, hotpot stations and workshop areas is the heart of the building: a place that understands hospitality as a social, not a consumer-oriented activity.

The smart "SmarTone Total Solutions" system intuitively and seamlessly controls the entire stay – an aspect that shows how important user-friendly technology has become in productive working environments.

What can companies and office planners learn from these examples?

1. Spaces must create a sense of belonging

Offices are becoming places that people consciously seek out – not just for work. Common areas, lounge zones, work cafés and open meeting places are taking on the role of social anchors.

2. Focus and interaction must be equally possible

As in hotels or hybrid hubs, today's offices need:

• quiet retreats
• flexible, acoustically stable focus zones
• Lively meeting areas

Only this combination creates a working environment where people can develop their full potential.

3. Hospitality means comfort, atmosphere and wellbeing

In contrast to classic office design, hybrid hospitality focuses on emotional factors:

• Light, colours and materials
• Comfortable furniture
• Intuitive wayfinding
• multisensory experiences

An office that feels good will also be used well.

4. Community is created – not left to chance

As TSH shows, community kitchens, events, open spaces and cultural offerings strengthen togetherness. For companies, this means that culture needs space, both literally and figuratively.

5. Flexibility is not a trend, but standard

Whether it's a short visit, a project phase or a team quarterly meeting, spaces need to grow with you. Modular furniture and zoned areas are essential.

Hybrid hospitality shows how spaces can become catalysts for encounters, connections and productivity. Offices that are successful today offer more than just workplaces – they offer experiences, atmosphere and genuine community.

The Social Hub and Townplace West Kowloon prove that when architecture, design and attitude work together, the result is an environment where people don't just work, they thrive. And that is precisely the opportunity for modern workplaces: to become places where people not only work, but also want to be.