An Awakened World…
and beyond!

From pioneering hoteliers and bold cultural custodians to immersive journeys that reshape how we see the world, this Awakened World issue of OutThere is an unabashed celebration of travel with purpose. At its heart: the winners and nominees of our fourth Experientialist Awards, spotlighting those redefining what meaningful travel looks like today. Alongside, we venture from South Australia’s Barossa to Chile’s elemental landscapes, Kentucky’s Appalachian wilds and beyond – encountering stories, people and places that challenge, inspire and invite us to get OutThere more consciously.

There’s a monumental shift happening in the way we move through the world. Travel, once defined by escape or indulgence, is becoming something altogether more powerful… more deliberate. The latest issue of OutThere leans into that shift, inviting you not just to go somewhere new, but to engage more deeply with why you go at all.

At its core are this year’s Experientialist Awards winners and shortlisters: not your usual parade of polished luxury, but a gathering of individuals and organisations who are asking harder questions and answering them with courage. These are the people proving that travel can give back more than it takes, that hospitality can be custodians of culture, that experiences can protect and preserve, and that a journey can leave something meaningful behind.

But our Awakened World issue isn’t just about accolades. It’s about perspective. To inspire travel with curiosity, yes – but also with intention. To seek wonder, but not at the expense of responsibility. To recognise that the most meaningful journeys are not always the most extravagant, but the most thoughtful.

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Higher paths

At a moment when too many leaders seek to harden borders and narrow our shared humanity, we celebrate those proving that travel – and creativity – can still connect, uplift and regenerate. We tell the story of the pioneer of regenerative tourism, who has created livelihoods, funded community initiatives and transformed futures, particularly for young women; and that of an OutThere couple who have transformed a fading artisanal tradition into a thriving, inclusive enterprise, employing local craftspeople, championing gender-neutral design and quietly nurturing a bold, queer creative energy within a complex cultural landscape.

Reimagining impact

“Phinda” – Zulu for “the return” – is more than a name; it is a philosophy made real by adventure operator andBeyond, whose restoration of Phinda Private Game Reserve from degraded farmland into a thriving wilderness of lions, elephants and cheetahs is matched by an equally profound investment in people, from schools and clinics to long-term community ownership. In Rwanda, we travel to Wilderness’s Wilderness Sabyinyo, which channels tourism directly into livelihoods, infrastructure and hope for hundreds of households. Elsewhere, Steppes Travel is reshaping who gets to tell the story of a place, empowering women – often from underrepresented communities – to become guides, leaders and custodians of their own narratives, while in Zambia, A&K Philanthropy’s Chipego Bike Shop has turned a handful of donated bicycles into a flourishing, women-led business that transforms lives and mobility alike.

Super connectors

In geopolitically uncertain times, when borders are hardening, and some travellers feel increasingly unwelcome, a vital counter-movement is emerging across hospitality, led by those who see inclusion not as a gesture, but as a responsibility. In Curacao, Janice Tjon Sien Kie continues to pave the way for LGBTQ+ rights – and tourism – after securing marriage equality for the island nation. In Madrid, David Díaz Molina has helped shape his hotel brand into a platform for LGBTQ+ visibility and cultural connection, where guests and staff alike are encouraged to show up fully and freely. Together with many other visionaries, these leaders show that true hospitality doesn’t just welcome the world. It helps reshape it, expanding belonging, dignity and opportunity for all.

Draped in glory

Ancient artisanal craft collides with radical new silhouettes, while streetwise swagger brings a dandy edge to the souks. A bold creative dawn is sweeping Marrakesh – vibrant, subversive, and unapologetically dressed to thrill.

Opening acts

Writer, BAFTA-nominated broadcaster and accessibility campaigner Sophie Morgan is clear-eyed about progress in travel: “Compared to 20 years ago, the industry has come on light years. Compared to where I want it to be? Nowhere near”. Her point is not one of criticism for its own sake, but a reminder that accessibility is still too often treated as an afterthought, even though disabled travellers represent a vast, diverse community that spans every identity – and, ultimately, every traveller’s future self. Yet she is equally quick to celebrate what excellence can look like in practice: from the beach wheelchairs, snorkelling hoists and tailored sensory environments at Amilla Maldives to the deeply immersive, multi-sensory safari experiences at Sabi Sabi Private Game Reserve, where wildlife encounters are thoughtfully translated through sound, touch and scent.

Movers and makers

One of travel’s most exhilarating rewards is its ability to immerse us in culture as participants in a living exchange where visitors, creators and host communities all stand to gain, and where heritage is not only preserved but continually reimagined. At Botanic Sanctuary Antwerp, a 15th-century monastery reborn in the heart of the city, guests are drawn into Antwerp’s layered identity through curated art, rarefied access to its world-class museums and collaborations with makers that reflect its status as both design capital and creative crossroads. And in Bavaria, Schloss Elmau goes further still, functioning as a self-contained world of music, ideas and performance, where everything from G7 summits to experimental dance retreats unfolds against an alpine backdrop. They prove that cultural travel experiences are not curated at arm’s length, but lived from within.

Frontier spirits

Travel at its most meaningful is also an act of self-renewal – where challenge, nature and stillness become tools for reconnection with both the world and oneself. Across the globe, a new generation of visionary retreats and expeditions is proving that personal transformation and planetary care can go hand in hand: from regenerative wellness at India’s Dharana at Shillim, to elemental fjord adventures with 62°NORD, cutting-edge polar science voyages with PONANT EXPLORATIONS GROUP, and culturally rich Himalayan journeys with Mountain Lodges of Nepal. Even in the Austrian Alps, the stripped-back sanctuary of eriro shows how radical simplicity can itself be regenerative.

The insiders’ guide to the most OutThere experiences and enclaves

Discover the luxury brands – from the quietly confident maisons that are doing things their own way, to the big-league names that command entire worlds of influence – that continue to redefine what it means to indulge well. These are not merely labels but orchestrators of experience, forever raising the bar in how we access, personalise and ultimately connect with the feelings, moments and experiences we most deeply desire from our journeys. Here are a few of those featured…

The world, OutThere

Guided by a simple conviction: that the most meaningful travel happens when we step closer to the people, places and ideas that shape a destination from within. We go out into the world to listen, to learn, and to look beyond the familiar rhythms of tourism. To meet those who live their craft rather than perform it. To understand landscapes not as backdrops, but as living systems of culture, memory and meaning. We travel because the world is not static, and neither are we. Each journey offers a chance to reset perspective – through flavour, through conversation, through silence, through movement itself. And in doing so, we find that travel is not escape, but engagement: a way of returning to ourselves, more awake to the richness of what surrounds us.

Bluegrass byways
Kentucky, USA

On a road trip into Kentucky’s Appalachian wildlands, Rupert Mellor traces the rugged roots of the Bluegrass State’s singular Southern culture, where history is etched into the hills and hospitality runs deep. Along the way, he encounters its evolving contemporary expression in two strikingly different cities – each revealing a side of Kentucky that is at once unexpectedly refined and defiantly authentic.

Flow states
Easter Island, Rapa Nui and Cachapoal Valley, Chile

At opposite ends of an epic journey across Chile’s astonishingly diverse landscapes and subcultures, Steffen Michels dives into two equally enigmatic yet radically different destinations – each carved in antiquity by the enduring force of water, and each revealing a distinct, elemental face of this endlessly compelling country.

The Dairyman
Barossa Valley, South Australia

Michael Wohlstadt didn’t set out to spark a gourmet revolution when he took over a tired sheep farm in South Australia’s Barossa Valley. Yet his instinct for quality and place quietly transformed it into a sought-after producer supplying some of the world’s most acclaimed restaurants – arriving, as it turns out, at a moment when the appetite for authenticity has never been more finely tuned.

Leaning in
Lake Constance, Überlingen, Germany

Slenderisation and detoxification were always expected outcomes from a stay at this pioneering fasting clinic. What came as the greater revelation, however, was something far less tangible – and far more profound: the shedding of spiritual and emotional weight.

Exploring everywhen
Australia

Must hours in transit be reduced to a temporal write-off? Opting for a four-day luxury train crossing over a five-hour coast-to-coast flight, OutThere explores Australia’s uniquely polymorphic relationship with time – where the journey itself becomes the point, and movement is reframed as experience rather than interruption.