2025 Women in Travel & Hospitality Conference

July 17 Agenda

8:30 - 9:30 AM

Provence Room

Arrival & Welcome Experience

Ariela Kiradjian, Partner & COO, BLLA and Co-Founder, StayBoutique

An immersive and elegant beginning to the day, this hour is curated to reflect calm, clarity, and the tone of what's to come.
Guests are invited to arrive slowly, welcomed by live instrumental music, locally sourced refreshments, and natural aromatics designed to ground the senses.
There are no press walls or branded clutter here.
Only a space that invites presence, connection, and an immediate shift into depth.

9:30 - 10:00 AM

Opening Remarks

Ariela and friends will open the conference with a powerful articulation of the theme: The Age of Aquarius.
We explore what it means to gather in this moment as women with influence—not to be inspired, but to lead.
The remarks offer an invitation to think differently about legacy, collaboration, and the purpose of our work in this sector. This is not motivation. This is recalibration.

10:00 - 10:30 AM

Keynote

10:30 - 11:00 AM

The Architect’s Mindset

Hospitality is not only about atmosphere. It is about structure. In this panel, we explore how visionary women are designing the systems—both visible and invisible—that support long-term excellence in travel and lodging. This is about brand architecture, leadership culture, succession planning, and capital strategy. These women are not decorators of space. They are architects of industry.

11:00 - 11:30 AM

 Experiences as the New Currency of Travel

Travel today is a search for depth, not luxury alone. As guests prioritize emotion, resonance, and cultural engagement, we ask: How do we design experiences that go beyond service? This panel unpacks the frameworks behind experiential hospitality—how memory is designed, how loyalty is forged through emotion, and how women in leadership are uniquely positioned to set the standard for experience-driven value.

11:30 - 12:00 PM

Presentation: The Politics of Space

What does space signal before a single word is spoken? This session examines the subtle architecture of power, identity, and intention within hospitality. Through the lens of a bold, ideologically-rooted hotel concept, we explore how design becomes a vehicle for values—not through decoration, but through disruption. This is about reclaiming authorship in an industry shaped by male, colonial, and commercial perspectives. What happens when space is no longer neutral? And what new forms of influence emerge when it is built, unapologetically, by and for women?

12:00 - 1:15 PM

Networking Lunch: The Belonging Table

Not your average networking lunch. This seated experience pairs guests intentionally based on industry alignment, growth stage, and mutual curiosity. Each table features a subtle prompt to open dialogue around legacy, emotional intelligence, reinvention, and vision. The food is locally inspired, the seating is pre-curated, and the intention is deep connection.

1:15 - 1:45 PM

Presentation: Personal Wealth

This session is about the architecture of wealth beyond accumulation. How do powerful women build personal wealth strategies that are not only profitable, but personal? This presentation explores asset protection, financial independence, and generational strategy—without the traditional language of scarcity or hustle. It's about alignment, clarity, and claiming wealth as a form of authorship.

1:45 - 2:15 PM

Conversation: The Rise of Solo Travel

A cultural evolution, not a market trend.
This conversation explores how women travelers are reshaping what freedom, agency, and exploration mean—and how the hospitality industry must shift to meet them.
From safety to space design, booking flows to emotional resonance, this session reveals what it takes to serve the self-directed, sovereign guest.

2:15 - 2:45 PM

Breakouts: The Aquarius Sessions

An intimate series of four simultaneous roundtables for nuanced conversation. Guests select one:

  • Capital & Consciousness: A discussion on aligned capital—how to fund and invest without compromising soul.

  • The Invisible Brand: A look at subtle identity, trust-building, and branding in the age of authenticity.

  • Sensorial Intelligence: How sound, scent, and texture inform memory and guest loyalty.

Heritage & Innovation: The art of evolving historic properties while maintaining their original soul.

2:45 - 3:15 PM

Community, Creativity, and Coming Together

How do we rebuild with soul?
This panel focuses on Los Angeles as a case study in resilience.
Emerging from wildfires and societal upheaval, the city’s tourism leaders are redefining collaboration and creative strategy as public service.
With global events like the Olympics on the horizon, the focus turns to community-led innovation and sustainable destination leadership.

3:15 - 3:45 PM

Afternoon Reset

Guests are invited into a world of silence, scent, and spaciousness.
A curated sensory experience encourages a soft reset of the nervous system, priming the mind and body for the final sessions of the day.
No programming, no performance. Just presence.

3:45 - 4:15 PM

Hospitality in the Age of Intelligence

Artificial intelligence, automation, and spatial computing are transforming the hospitality industry.
This conversation moves beyond the hype to examine how emotionally intelligent tech can support—not replace—human experience.
Topics include predictive service, digital sovereignty, personalization ethics, and the role of women in shaping the next generation of technological frameworks in hospitality.

4:15 - 4:45 PM

Fireside Dialogue: Courage and Connection

A raw and refined dialogue on how courage manifests for high-level women leaders: boundary-setting, emotional clarity, and the decision to lead without apology.
This conversation is not about empowerment. It’s about power.

4:45 - 5:15 PM

Closing Keynote: The Power of Subtle Influence

Influence today is not declared—it is sensed.
This closing keynote explores how modern leadership is evolving away from volume and visibility toward precision, discernment, and presence.
A meditation on energetic leadership, executive elegance, and the long game.

5:15 - 6:30 PM

Private Evening Salon

The day closes in community. Guests are invited to sip wine, listen to live music, and drop into meaningful conversation in curated salon corners:

  • Inheriting and Evolving Legacy Businesses

  • The Business of Privacy and Discretion

  • Hospitality as Art

  • Redefining Success in a Second Career

Each salon offers gentle facilitation for those who want it—and space for unstructured resonance for those who don’t.
This is not a reception.
This is reconnection.