Media Type: Articles

Reflecting the Soul of a Place: A Conversation with IMPACT 2025 Award Recipient, Celes Davar

Meet Celes Davar: A Storyteller, Guide, and Champion of Community-Rooted Tourism   This year’s IMPACT 2025 Award celebrates a visionary who has long believed that the most meaningful travel experiences don’t just take place on the main stage; they unfold in community halls, hidden trails, shared meals, and impromptu kitchen… Read more

Visual Journeys: Gunjan Menon on Ethical Filmmaking and Regenerative Tourism

Gunjan Menon in the field, exploring the religious significance of freshwater turtles. Author: Beyond Premieres, Source: The Explorers Club.

What happens when we stop capturing stories and start co-creating them? At IMPACT 2025, award-winning filmmaker and storyteller Gunjan Menon joined us to explore exactly that. In her keynote, Visual Journeys: Harnessing Filmmaking and Storytelling, Gunjan shared how film can be a powerful tool for shifting tourism narratives, from extractive… Read more

Challenging Growth: Hege V. Barnes on Regenerative Tourism, Bold Leadership, and the Future of Travel

The Vision of the Fjords, the world's first hybrid-electric vessel in light carbon fibre material sails across the stretch Gudvangen-Flam in Norway. Photo by VisitNorway.com.

  What if not all growth is good? At IMPACT 2025, Hege V. Barnes, Managing Director of Innovation Norway USA, delivered a keynote that challenged the tourism industry to rethink its assumptions about success. With more than 27 years of experience in North America and a career spanning global marketing,… Read more