Luxury travel has become oddly conservative. Not only because hotel groups keep opening in the same places, but because many travellers are doing the same thing.

For years, well-travelled people prided themselves on discovering new places. They wanted the lesser-known island, the eccentric owner-run hotel, the riad nobody had heard of, the beach that had not yet been turned into a hashtag. Now, many of the same people say they want unusual destinations and alternative brands, but when it comes time to spend serious money, they retreat to the familiar. They ask for originality, then book the Maldives. They ask for a more interesting Thai beach escape, then choose Rosewood Phuket over the independent property I have recommended because the name feels safer, which is not quite the same thing as better.

That, to me, is the contradiction at the heart of modern luxury travel. Travellers still talk about discovery, but increasingly buy reassurance. Hotel groups do much the same. Everyone speaks about new frontiers, then huddles in the same handful of places.

Look at the openings. The Maldives, Mykonos, Santorini, Ibiza, Bodrum, Lake Como, Dubai, Riviera Maya. Again and again, the big names go where another big name has already made the place respectable. Easy flights, high rates, villas, residences, honeymooners, private jets and travel advisors who already know how to sell the destination. Soul may be seductive, but it rarely looks as convincing on a spreadsheet.

Once one major brand arrives, the others follow. If Aman, Six Senses, Rosewood or One&Only can make a destination work, everyone else assumes there must be room for another flag. It is not discovery. It is expensive repetition.

This year alone, the pattern feels almost comically obvious. Mandarin Oriental opens in Mallorca in what was, until recently, a fairly unremarkable three-star hotel, now repriced at roughly €2,500 a night. Four Seasons opens in Mykonos barely eighteen months after opening another resort in Mallorca. Aman adds yet another resort in the Maldives. These are not obscure destinations waiting to be discovered. They are already full of luxury hotels. But they are easy to explain, easy to price and easy to sell.

I am writing this from Niseko, another example. Ten years ago, the luxury conversation here barely extended beyond the Hilton. Now there is a Park Hyatt and a Ritz-Carlton Reserve, while Aman and Chedi are reportedly on the way. The big groups all arrive within a few years of one another. By then, the destination is no longer a discovery, just the next stop on the circuit.

I am also here looking at smaller, more individual properties, because that is usually where the more interesting story hides. Not always the best hotel, perhaps, and certainly not always the safest. But often the place where there is still some character left before the destination is fully polished, branded and priced into submission.

Travellers have moved in the same direction. I understand why. At €2,000 a night, with limited holiday time and a partner or family to please, a recognisable name feels like insurance. If the eccentric owner-run hotel has a bad week, you have burned your one major trip of the year. Aman, Rosewood, Four Seasons and Cheval Blanc sell reassurance before the guest has even arrived. The logo says status, taste and safety. It also quietly removes the need to explain the choice.

Covid made this worse. After years of uncertainty, many travellers became more cautious, not less. A trusted brand suddenly carried emotional value. Certainty became part of the amenity list.

Social media has turned the whole thing into a luxury checklist. Aman, Rosewood, Four Seasons, Cheval Blanc, Capella, Airelles: the names are collected, displayed and approved one by one. I see it constantly. The question is no longer always “was it memorable?” but “have I done it?” The hotel becomes less a place than a credential.

So the hotels and the guests now encourage each other. The brands go where travellers already feel comfortable spending silly money. Travellers book the brands because the names feel safe. The result is a small number of hotels, in a small number of places, all chasing the same idea of luxury. Even Aman, once a byword for singularity, increasingly arrives with the same Arva restaurant and broadly the same breakfast, whether you are in Venice, Tokyo or Bangkok. Travellers say they want culture, but often what they really want is local flavour without too much inconvenience.

What gets lost is everything in the gaps. Why not Syros, Tinos, Serifos, Patmos, Sifnos, Menorca or Formentera? Because Mykonos, Santorini, Mallorca and Ibiza already absorb the spending. A smaller, quieter island may have more soul, but it also comes with a shorter season, weaker infrastructure, planning restrictions, staff shortages, water issues and fewer international flights. The Maldives, by contrast, almost sells itself: one island, one resort, seaplane transfers, overwater villas, privacy and a destination already embedded in the luxury imagination. Even the logistics sound glamorous, which is not something one can often say about logistics.

This has changed my job too. Ten years ago, the work was often about finding the hotel people had not yet heard of. Now, that is only part of it. The harder task is working out which of the familiar names still has a soul, which independent hotel is genuinely special rather than merely photogenic, which room is worth booking, which restaurant is the real one, and whether the service still holds together when nobody important is watching. The internet shows everything except the things that matter. Those still require being there.

Meanwhile, billions continue to pour into giant headline-grabbing projects in Saudi Arabia, even as some developments slow down, sit empty or quietly lose momentum. It is still easier to announce the future than to make somewhere quietly excellent work.

And the cost of all this, in the end, is memorability. Many of the most expensive resorts in the world today can be simultaneously flawless and strangely forgettable. The hotel I am sitting in performs almost faultlessly. But does it make my heart race? Not really.

A slightly imperfect independent hotel with warmth, eccentricity and personality, by contrast, can stay with you for decades. Both things are true at once. The brand is often the rational choice. The independent is usually the memorable one.

Most luxury travel today is designed to eliminate risk. The problem is that risk is often where memory lives.