A particular kind of confidence comes from being right before anyone else believed you. Can Topcu has that confidence. The Istanbul-based luxury hospitality advisor coined the term “bohemian luxury” at a Cannes tourism fair years before the category existed, watched the room respond with polite scepticism, and then built Ahama into Turkey’s first seaside property accepted into Relais and Chateaux. Today, with two Michelin Keys and a Condé Nast Traveller Readers’ Choice among the properties he has advised, he has earned the right to speak about the future of luxury travel with authority.
Chic Icon magazine has known Can Topcu for some time, and we have long trusted his instinct, taste and discerning eye when it comes to exceptional hotels and restaurants in Turkey. That is precisely why we wanted to sit down with him for this exclusive conversation — to hear his perspective on where luxury hospitality is heading, and what truly sets a remarkable experience apart.
Luxury hospitality today is no longer defined only by five-star service. What is your personal philosophy behind creating a truly iconic luxury experience?
Can Topcu: The world shifted after the pandemic, and luxury hospitality has never quite returned to what it was before. What people are searching for today is fundamentally different. They are not looking for a checklist of five-star amenities. They are looking for a feeling, a story, a place that gives them something they cannot buy anywhere else.
My philosophy begins there. Before a single design decision is made or a service standard is written, I ask one question: what will the guest remember ten years from now? Not the thread count, not the Michelin-starred restaurant. The moment. The unexpected view at dusk. The private dinner that felt like it was prepared only for them. The stillness of a place that felt like the world had paused just for their arrival.
Post-pandemic travellers have become remarkably intentional. They choose fewer trips but invest more deeply in each one. They travel toward meaning, toward their family, their closest friends, experiences that mark time in a way that ordinary life no longer can. Isolated locations, unconventional concepts, and properties with a genuine soul have risen precisely because of this.
What makes Turkish hospitality unique, and how can brands preserve authentic Turkish identity while meeting international luxury standards?
Can Topcu: Turkish hospitality is not something we invented. It is something we inherited. For centuries, welcoming a guest with genuine warmth, generosity and grace has been woven into who we are as a people. That instinct is real, and it is rare. No international brand can train it into their staff in six months. It lives in culture, in memory, in the way a Turkish host makes you feel like the most important person in the room without any script telling them to do so.
Turkey is experiencing a remarkable moment. International luxury brands are entering the market with serious intent. Bodrum, Göcek, Fethiye, Istanbul, Cappadocia, Izmir, and the Urla peninsula are no longer well-kept secrets. But to truly take our place alongside the Mediterranean’s greatest luxury destinations, we need to change how we think about the guest journey.
For too long, we have built extraordinary hotels and then drawn an invisible wall around them. The traveller who spends four nights in a beautiful resort and never experiences the old town, the local market, the fishing harbour at sunrise- that traveller has only seen half of what Turkey can offer. The next chapter of Turkish luxury hospitality is about integrating our properties into the full richness of their surroundings.
What are the key elements that transform a beautiful hotel into a legendary destination?
Can Topcu: If you look at the last decade of luxury hotel development, the architectural and design bar has never been higher. A stunning building is now the baseline. It is the entry ticket, not the differentiator. What separates a beautiful hotel from a legendary one is never the structure. It is the soul.
That soul comes from two things: the people who bring the property to life, and the depth of conviction behind the concept. A hotel that truly understands where it is, its landscape, its history, its local culture, will always outperform one that imports a generic luxury formula. And then there are the people. The warmth in a room that no interior designer can specify and no operations manual can manufacture. Great hospitality is still, at its core, a deeply human act.
How do you approach brand storytelling, guest experience design, and creating moments that become part of a hotel’s legacy?
Can Topcu: Positioning is the moment a brand stops competing and starts belonging to a category of its own. Whatever the brand promises, every single moment the guest experiences must prove it. Not just at check-in. The story begins the moment the guest lands. By the time they reach the room, the brand has already either kept its word or quietly broken it.
Consistency is everything, and it is far harder than it sounds. A concept needs at minimum three years of committed, unwavering execution before it truly takes root. Too many properties reinvent themselves every season chasing trends and, in doing so, never build anything lasting.
But the insight I have come to value most in recent years is something more personal. Creating truly memorable moments is about being present in them. Sharing a meal with guests. Sitting with them for a drink at sunset. Becoming, in a genuine way, part of their holiday. The best friendships are formed on holiday. A hotel, at its best, should be the best friend waiting for you when you arrive.
What trends will define the next generation of luxury travel?
Can Topcu: The next chapter will be defined by one word: personal. Not personalised in the algorithmic sense. Truly, deeply personal. A stay that feels as though it was conceived specifically for you. The curated itinerary is becoming the new currency of luxury. High-net-worth travellers no longer want to be handed a list of activities at check-in. They want someone who already knows them to have thought it all through before they arrive.
The concept of what constitutes a luxury location has already been radically reimagined. A remote fishing village in Finland becomes a design hotel that sells out months in advance. A constellation of desert tents in the Arabian Peninsula redefines what a five-star night looks like. Stargazing in silence from a private terrace in the middle of nowhere becomes more coveted than any city penthouse. The luxury traveller has grown deeply bored of the predictable.
Wellness will move well beyond the spa and into the entire architecture of the stay. Sustainability will stop being a marketing footnote and become a genuine condition of desirability. And above all, the human connection will return to the centre of everything. Technology will handle the logistics. People will create the memories.
What have collaborations with global brands and personalities taught you about leadership and building brands that resonate beyond hospitality?
Can Topcu: The most valuable thing any career in luxury hospitality gives you is not a title or a portfolio of prestigious projects. It is the people. The relationships built across years of shared ambition, creative risk and genuine human connection. Every meaningful collaboration has taught me something no business school could.
The deepest lesson has been about community. The old model of luxury was transactional. The new model is relational. The most powerful thing a luxury property can build is not a brand. It is a circle of like-minded people who feel a genuine sense of belonging to that place and to each other. Networks are transactional. Communities are emotional. The brands that understand the difference develop a following that no advertising budget could manufacture.
Which project represents your vision of hospitality the most, and what legacy would you like to leave?
Can Topcu: Twenty-five years leaves you with a lot of moments. But a few names live closest to my heart.
Ahama holds a very special place. I was the first person in hospitality to introduce the term “bohemian luxury” as a positioning framework for a property. I remember standing in Cannes at the tourism fair using those words, and watching the room respond with polite scepticism. The category did not exist yet. And then we opened, and the market understood immediately. Ahama became Turkey’s first seaside property accepted into Relais and Chateaux. That validation confirmed what we had believed, and what I had dared to name, when nobody else did.
Princes’ Palace on Buyukada is another chapter I am deeply proud of. The only resort in Istanbul, a Leading Hotels of the World member, a property unlike anything else the city can offer. When Cartier brought one of the most memorable events of the year to that island, that moment was not an accident. It was the result of years of careful, patient brand building.
Airstream was a different kind of dream. One hundred years of American heritage, something people in Turkey had only ever seen in Hollywood films. We brought it to life in the Turkish market, believing Turkey was ready for a new category of luxury lifestyle before the market knew it was.
And Sungate Port Royal holds its own place. Turkey’s first seven-star resort. Its own marina, private villas, 1,100 rooms. For years, the most expensive hotel in the country. The brand equity we built became part of the property’s value, and when it was sold to MIRAX Group for 250 million dollars, that record sale spoke for itself.
As for the legacy I would like to leave, it is simpler than any of those projects. I would like to be remembered as someone who genuinely believed in Turkey. Who saw the potential of this country’s hospitality before the rest of the world caught up, and spent a career giving it the positioning it deserved.
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