Regenerative Design Approach for Twin Transition in Travel and Tourism Sector

Nowadays, design is experiencing a turn towards complexity, from the product to the value-chain level, to tackle the challenges of new ‘phygital’ (physical + digital) socio-technical systems. This is opening designers to new advanced sectors but is also leading to reframing established research domains. Among those, Tourism is characterised by a highly complex and fragmented value chain, marked by a business-as-usual model that needs design-driven innovation. It has been a front-runner sector in e-commerce, but this has mainly affected booking processes and commercial transactions. A systemic transition towards digital innovation is still lacking. The design discipline has missed the holistic perspective needed to understand the mutual relationships between the actors in the system. This process is even more urgent considering the global and local impacts of travel experiences, which the pandemic has just paused but not stopped. Decision-makers are increasingly striving for a sustainable sector transition; hence the research community is advancing systemic reflections on a regenerative culture of tourism. Design can support this new scenario, exploring how tourism can generate social, environmental, and economic value and well-being within the visited context, improving the travel experience through sustainable behaviours. The chapter will address the complexity behind the socio-technical tourism system and the digital-physical experiences that travellers undergo to explore, plan, book, live and then remember and share a journey. Present and future strategies for regenerative tourism are examined to define the ongoing and forward-looking trends that can involve design disciplines. These include designing and managing sustainable dynamics through stakeholder engagement practices, mapping and using data and digital information, designing communication and physical products supporting regenerative travel experiences.