Why the best destination resorts let the land inform the design
By RVI’s Alex Fenech, ASLA, Vice President, Coral Springs, Florida and Brett Allen Park, Vice President, Costa Mesa, California
RVi’s Vice Presidents, Alex Fenech, FASLA, and Brett Allen Park have more than four decades of experience shaping hospitality destinations worldwide. Their work has ranged from luxury resorts and branded residences to destination entertainment districts, theme parks, waterfront developments, and projects for some of the world’s most recognizable hospitality brands, including Marriott, The EDITION Hotel West Hollywood, Rosewood, Sheraton, Hilton, and Disney. Through these experiences, they have learned a simple but often overlooked truth: the most authentic and enduring destinations emerge when developers allow the land to lead the vision.
Hospitality developers are not simply creating buildings. They are creating memories, emotions, and experiences that guests will carry with them long after they leave.
That responsibility becomes even more complex when a project is located in an environmentally sensitive area. Whether along a vulnerable coastline, within a wetland system, near critical wildlife habitat, or in a water-constrained environment, developers often face a familiar question: How do we overcome the site’s constraints?
In our experience, that question often leads projects in the wrong direction.
Between us, we have spent more than four decades planning and designing hospitality destinations across North America, the Caribbean, the Middle East, Asia, and Australia. Our work has included luxury resorts, branded residences, convention destinations, theme parks, golf communities, and mixed-use hospitality environments for some of the world’s most recognized brands and operators. Across that work, one lesson has remained constant: the most memorable destinations are not imposed upon the land. They are discovered through it.
The hospitality industry is experiencing a fundamental shift. Guests increasingly seek authentic, place-based experiences. Investors are prioritizing long-term resilience. Operators are demanding higher performance standards. At the same time, environmental systems are becoming increasingly important to permitting, financing, operations, and long-term asset value.
We believe the environment is often our greatest opportunity. When resilience, ecology, guest experience, and operational performance are considered together from the beginning, developers can create destinations that are more authentic, more memorable, and ultimately more valuable.
Let the land inform the design
Every site tells a story.
Too often, hospitality projects begin with room counts, density targets, parking requirements, arrival sequences, and predetermined programming. The design team is then tasked with fitting those elements onto the site as efficiently as possible.
We believe the process should work in reverse.
The most successful destinations begin by understanding the environmental systems that make a place unique. Climate, topography, hydrology, vegetation, wildlife, viewsheds, cultural history, and ecological relationships should inform the design from the outset.
Some of the most meaningful lessons we have learned have come from projects where environmental conditions have fundamentally changed the development approach. Wetlands altered circulation patterns. Wildlife corridors influenced where development could occur. Shoreline conditions reshaped programming decisions. Natural view corridors dictated the placement of guest amenities.
In nearly every case, the final outcome was stronger because of those constraints, not despite them.
The hospitality industry often speaks about creating a sense of place, yet many destinations still begin with a generic development formula and attempt to adapt it to the site. That approach frequently results in experiences that feel interchangeable.
The projects that stand apart are those that embrace their environmental context.
Great guest experiences are rooted in environmental authenticity
Hospitality is fundamentally different from other forms of development.
A guest does not choose a destination because it has the most efficient parking lot or the highest density. They choose it because of how it makes them feel.
The most successful hospitality brands understand this. Whether working with luxury operators, branded residences, boutique hotels, or destination resorts, we consistently see one common expectation: create an experience that guests cannot find anywhere else.
Today’s travelers are increasingly seeking immersion, authenticity, and connection to nature. They want experiences that feel rooted in place. They want to discover something unique, not something replicated.
That might mean observing turtle nesting activity along a protected shoreline. It could mean experiencing a dark sky free from light pollution. It may be a boardwalk through a mangrove ecosystem, views across preserved wetlands, or the sounds of native wildlife rather than mechanical equipment.
At RVi, we spend significant time thinking about how guest experiences, operational performance, and environmental stewardship intersect. Successful hospitality design requires more than beautiful spaces. It requires careful consideration of arrival sequences, pedestrian circulation, service access, maintenance operations, outdoor programming, wellness experiences, food and beverage environments, and brand expectations.
When done successfully, guests leave with memories that could only have been created in that location. Those memories become the foundation of a destination’s identity and long-term success.
Resilience, ecology, and business performance are no longer separate conversations
For years, resilience was something we talked about primarily in terms of risk. It meant protecting property from storms, flooding, or other environmental threats. While those concerns remain important, we’ve come to see resilience as something much bigger. Today, it influences permitting, insurance, operations, guest expectations, and ultimately the long-term value of a destination.
While much of our work focuses on hospitality destinations, some of the strongest examples of these planning principles can be found in master-planned communities. Resort amenities, clubhouses, waterfront experiences, trail systems, wellness spaces, and gathering places are often woven into larger communities, making the lessons learned from community planning directly applicable to destination development.
Our colleagues Alexis Crespo, Vice President of Planning, and Sabrina McCabe, Director of Landscape Architecture in RVi’s Bonita Springs office have helped shape many of these planning principles through projects like Babcock Ranch and Silverstrand in Southwest Florida, bringing a deep understanding of how environmental systems can create stronger communities. Their work demonstrates that sustainability begins long before the first building is designed. It starts with understanding how a site naturally functions and allowing those systems to guide planning decisions from day one.
Although Babcock Ranch is a master-planned community rather than a hospitality destination, its planning approach offers valuable lessons for any project rooted in environmentally sensitive land. Instead of forcing the landscape to fit a development program, the planning team allowed the site’s natural systems to shape the community. Wetlands, drainage patterns, wildlife habitat, and open space became the framework for development—not constraints to overcome.
Babcock Ranch demonstrated the value of that approach during Hurricane Ian. While many surrounding communities experienced widespread flooding and prolonged power outages, the town remained largely operational because years of thoughtful planning respected the site’s natural hydrology, preserved its environmental systems, and invested in resilient infrastructure from the outset. It serves as a powerful reminder that resilience isn’t achieved through a single design feature—it’s the cumulative result of hundreds of planning decisions made with the land, not against it.
That same philosophy is evident at Silverstrand, an 800-acre master-planned community in northeast Lee County. Under Alexis’ planning leadership, the team implemented a density incentive strategy that clustered development in exchange for restoring former agricultural land with native Florida vegetation. More than 60 percent of the site was permanently conserved, including over 300 acres of restored upland habitat strategically located to reconnect wetland systems and buffer neighboring rural properties. Working alongside Alexis, Sabrina’s landscape architecture expertise helped transform those conservation areas into ecological assets that strengthened the community’s identity while enhancing long-term environmental performance.
When ecological systems become part of the design rather than something the design works around, resilience, guest experience, operational performance, and long-term value reinforce one another. That’s the kind of planning we believe will define the next generation of destination development.
The most memorable destinations are shaped by the land itself
If there is one lesson our experience has reinforced, it’s that the most memorable destinations are often the ones shaped by the character of the land itself. Environmental systems are opportunities to create places with a stronger sense of identity, deeper connections to nature, and experiences that simply couldn’t exist anywhere else.
Whether we’re planning a luxury resort, a branded residential community, a convention destination, or an amenity-rich master-planned community, our approach remains the same. Every site has its own story, shaped by its ecology, history, and natural systems. Our role as designers (and planners) is to understand those qualities and translate them into places that enrich the guest experience, support long-term operations, and remain resilient for generations.
Hospitality is ultimately about creating places people remember. In our experience, the destinations that leave the greatest impression are those that celebrate the character of the land, creating experiences that feel authentic, enduring, and uniquely connected to their surroundings.
