Emotional Luxury, Akeshi Akinseye
Luxury Hospitality & Guest-Experience Consulting
Luxury is a feeling.
I help restaurants, hotels, private clubs, and spas design the experience guests remember, and return for. Every sense, every touchpoint, from the welcome to the goodbye.
Founder of Kesh Events and The Art of Celebrating · Three-time author · Featured in People, Architectural Digest & The New York Times
Hospitality consulting is the practice of auditing and redesigning the guest experience across every sensory and service touchpoint, from the welcome to the follow-up, to grow loyalty, reviews, and revenue. I provide it for restaurants, hotels, private clubs, and spas.
- Focus: how your guests feel
- For: restaurants, hotels, clubs, spas, venues
- Where: Chicago & nationwide
- Starts with: a fixed-scope Experience Audit
The Opportunity
Why guest experience is the advantage now
Guests no longer choose on product alone, they choose on how a place makes them feel. The venues that win do it on experience. Better experience compounds into four things that move the bottom line:
More 5-star reviews
Guests write about how they felt, not the menu. Designed moments become the lines in your reviews.
More repeat guests
Loyalty is built in feeling, not price. People return to the places that made them feel seen.
More referrals
A surprising, well-designed moment is the thing guests tell their friends about.
Higher spend per guest
People pay more, and come more often, where they feel genuinely hosted.
The Philosophy
Luxury isn't what you spend. It's how you make people feel.
Emotional Luxury is the belief behind every engagement: the most profitable hospitality is the kind guests can feel, and come back for. They forget the menu. They remember the room. Five principles carry it.
The feeling is the product.
Host the guest first.
Every touchpoint is a message.
Design the senses, design the memory.
The goodbye matters as much as the welcome.
My Method
The Felt Journey
Every guest experience is really five moments. I audit the gap between what is served and what is felt at each one, then redesign the highest-leverage moments first.
Arrival & Anticipation
The first 60 seconds and the threshold: what guests feel before anything is delivered.
Welcome & Recognition
Being seen and expected, not processed.
The Core Experience
Sensory cohesion, pacing, and atmosphere: light, sound, scent, tabletop, flow.
The Signature Moment
The one designed surprise guests describe to others.
Send-off & After
The goodbye, the last impression, and the follow-up that builds a relationship.
Audited through the five senses (sight, sound, scent, taste, touch) and every detail most places overlook: linens, glassware, plating, florals, lighting, the welcome, and the goodbye.
How We Work Together
Consulting services
Three ways in, designed so one-time work leads to ongoing partnership. Every engagement begins with the Experience Audit.
Luxury Experience Audit
A fixed-scope diagnosis of your full guest journey, experienced as a guest.
- Five-senses & atmosphere audit
- Service-ritual review
- Journey mapped across the five moments
- Prioritized 30/60/90-day plan
The Signature Revamp
Hands-on redesign and rollout of the experience the audit reveals.
- Guest-journey redesign
- Ambiance & sensory direction
- Signature-moment & service rituals
- Staff training + rollout plan
The Apex Partnership
Experience excellence as a standard, your fractional Chief Experience Officer.
- Ongoing advisory & reviews
- Seasonal & signature programming
- Service-standards guidance
- New-opening experience design
Who I Work With
Built for experience-led venues
Restaurants
From fine dining to beloved neighborhood rooms.
Hotels & resorts
Arrival, stay, and the spaces in between.
Private clubs
Where member experience is the whole product.
Spas & wellness
The ritual from welcome to relaxation to checkout.
Lounges & bars
Ambiance, ritual, and the signature moment.
Cafés
Design-forward and multi-location concepts.
Event venues
The full guest journey, start to send-off.
Hospitality groups
Consistency of experience across concepts.
Proof & Recognition
I've done this work
Gene & Georgetti
A paid consulting engagement with the full restaurant and events team to define the ideal client experience, closing with a hands-on flower-arranging session.
Viceroy Sugar Beach
Elevated the guest experience across every touchpoint: arrival and property transfer, check-in, and the event spaces.
Featured In
People · Architectural Digest · The New York Times · Forbes · Essence · Brides
About
Akeshi Akinseye
I've built my career curating unforgettable experiences for high-net-worth clients alongside the world's finest hotels, resorts, chefs, and tastemakers. As founder of Kesh Events and a three-time author, my reputation rests on a single idea: the details no one else notices are exactly what guests remember.
Luxury celebrations are the highest-stakes live hospitality there is, one shot, deeply emotional, hundreds of details. I bring that same discipline to restaurants, hotels, clubs, and spas: hosting the guest first, and designing how every sense makes them feel.
Luxury is a feeling, and feeling is what brings guests back.
Questions
Frequently asked questions
What does a hospitality consultant do?
A hospitality consultant audits and redesigns the guest experience across every sensory and service touchpoint, from arrival to follow-up, to grow guest loyalty, reviews, and revenue.
How much does hospitality consulting cost?
Engagements begin with a fixed-scope Experience Audit, followed by optional implementation (the Signature Revamp) or an ongoing retainer (the Apex Partnership). Pricing is tailored to the size and scope of your venue and shared on a short fit call.
What types of businesses do you work with?
Restaurants, hotels and resorts, private clubs, spas and wellness spaces, lounges and bars, cafés, and event venues, anywhere the guest experience drives the business.
What areas do you serve?
I'm based in Chicago and work with venues across the United States and internationally.
What is a guest-experience audit?
A guest-experience audit is a structured, outside-eye assessment of a business experienced as a guest, scoring every sensory and service moment and delivering a prioritized plan to improve how guests feel and what they spend.
How is this different from a typical restaurant consultant?
Most consultants focus on operations and menus. I focus on emotional experience, how every sense and touchpoint makes guests feel, drawing on a global career designing luxury experiences for discerning clients.
Let's Begin
Start with an Experience Audit
Tell me about your business. I'll follow up to schedule a short fit call and share what I'd look at first.
Prefer email? hello@akeshiakinseye.com