How We Design a Journey Around Different Traveller Interests

No two travellers arrive with the same curiosities. One may want to stand before a Caravaggio, another wants to understand the city’s political past, while someone else remembers a place through its food. Some enjoy long days of exploration; others need time to pause. A thoughtfully designed journey does not ask everyone to travel in exactly the same way. It finds the experiences that bring different interests together—while leaving enough room for individual discovery.

It begins with a conversation

Before we decide what belongs in an itinerary, we try to understand the people taking the journey. What draws them to a destination? What subjects make them curious? Do they enjoy museums, neighbourhood walks, local food, music, architecture or conversations with people? How much activity feels exciting—and when does it begin to feel exhausting? Just as importantly, we ask how they like to travel. A person who loves history may prefer a lively storytelling walk to several hours inside a museum. Someone interested in art may enjoy painting in a garden more than moving rapidly through galleries. These conversations reveal more than a list of preferences. They tell us how each traveller wants to experience a place.

We look for a connecting thread

Different interests do not necessarily require separate itineraries. Often, the most memorable experiences sit at the intersection of several curiosities. A visit to a traditional market can reveal local food, neighbourhood culture, architecture and everyday life. A historic café may introduce a city’s writers, artists and political movements over a single cup of coffee. A guided walk can connect wartime history with street art, urban design and the lives of people who inhabit those streets today. Instead of treating every interest as a separate box to tick, we look for experiences that allow several stories to unfold together.

One journey, many ways into a city

Consider a journey through Rome, Berlin and Paris. In Rome, history is not confined to monuments. It appears in the roads beneath your feet, in family recipes, in churches still used by local communities and in neighbourhoods shaped over centuries. A morning exploring the Appian Way might be followed by making pizza with a Roman host—two very different experiences that together reveal how the city carries its past into daily life. Berlin calls for another approach. Its history is recent, layered and sometimes difficult. Understanding the Second World War, the Cold War and the Berlin Wall changes the way you see an ordinary street or railway station. But the city is also creative, youthful and constantly reinventing itself. Pairing historical exploration with contemporary art, music or a hands-on creative experience allows travellers to encounter both the Berlin that remembers and the Berlin that experiments. In Paris, an art lover may want the Louvre or Musée d’Orsay, while another traveller would rather understand French life through a bakery, a neighbourhood or a shared table. The journey can hold both. A museum visit might be balanced with a croissant workshop, a walk through Montmartre or an afternoon painting in a garden associated with Monet. The aim is not to fit in everything. It is to choose experiences that help each city reveal itself from more than one angle.

We design for different energy levels

Interests matter, but so does pace. Even travellers who are equally curious may have very different levels of stamina. Some are ready to keep exploring after dinner. Others enjoy the day more when they have an unhurried afternoon or time to return to the hotel before the evening. We therefore build rhythm into a journey: immersive days followed by lighter ones, structured experiences balanced with free time, and opportunities to opt in or step back without missing the heart of the trip. Free time is not an empty space in the itinerary. It allows one traveller to visit another gallery, another to browse a bookshop, and someone else to sit at a café and watch the city go by. Those individual hours often become some of the most personal parts of a journey.

The group still needs a shared story

Personalisation does not mean that everyone spends the trip following a separate schedule. The joy of a small-group journey lies in the moments experienced together—the conversation after an unexpected discovery, the meal where the day’s stories are exchanged, or the laughter that comes from trying something unfamiliar. We identify the experiences that should form the shared core of the journey and create flexibility around them. Travellers may engage with the same place for different reasons, but they return with something to talk about together. An art lover and a history enthusiast may notice entirely different details during the same walk. Around the dinner table, their perspectives enrich each other’s experience.

Preparation makes curiosity deeper

Our Before You Travel sessions help travellers begin exploring their interests even before departure. Through readings, discussions, films and informal conversations, we introduce the historical, cultural and artistic context of the places ahead. Travellers can ask questions, share what fascinates them and discover interests they may not have considered before. This preparation changes the experience on the ground. A building is no longer simply beautiful; you recognise the ideas that shaped it. A neighbourhood is no longer just picturesque; you understand the lives and events behind it. Context leads to recognition. Recognition creates connection. And connection can become inspiration—whether it finds expression through writing, painting, cooking, photography or simply a new way of looking at the world.

A journey should feel designed, not assembled

A meaningful itinerary is more than a collection of highly rated attractions. It has rhythm, intention and a point of view. Designing around different interests requires choices. We leave out experiences that may be famous but add little to the journey. We reconsider an activity if it repeats a story already told elsewhere. We make space for encounters that may be quieter but reveal something genuine about the destination. The result is not a trip where every person loves every activity equally. That would be unrealistic. It is a journey where every traveller feels considered, remains curious and encounters moments that speak directly to them. Because the best journeys do not simply show you a place. They give you your own way into its story.