Tourism and Place Design: Designing Places to Live, Operate and Visit

This book explores the tourism place design trialectic. It shows how destinations are assembled and gain meaning via social, material and ecological processes.

Drawing on human geography, tourism and media studies, the book combines theoretical perspectives such as the second gaze, participatory design, more-than-human design and digital mediation, with empirical case studies ranging from rural landscapes to culinary tourism, overtourism and VR environments and AI-driven tourism experience design. In sum, this anthology offers analytical tools and novel theoretical frameworks that throw light on the contested material and digital terrain of tourism place design.

The book is intended for students, researchers, planners, designers and professionals working with tourism development, place-making and destination planning.

Fredrik Hoppstadius is Senior Lecturer in Human Geography at Karlstad University, Sweden, and Programme Director for the Tourism and Place Design programme. His research explores the intersections between tourism, landscape and posthuman design, with a particular focus on mobility, rurality and sustainability.

Mekonnen Tesfahuney is Professor of Human Geography at Karlstad University, Sweden. His work engages with postcolonial theory, critical geopolitics and mobility studies. He has published extensively on global migration, tourism and the politics of difference.

Ulrika Åkerlund is Senior Lecturer in Human Geography at Karlstad University, Sweden. Her research focusses on tourism planning, regional development, crisis and resilience management and everyday life practices in Nordic and European contexts. She has led several research projects on migration and rural change.