Over recent decades, tourism has been a major driver of transformation in Alpine territories, shaping urbanisation processes and settlement models. Today, climate change, socio-economic shifts, overtourism and abandonment are redefining its role in mountain areas. In this context, hospitality emerges as a key device mediating between tourism, temporary dwelling and territorial regeneration. The paper explores an ecological approach to hospitality, interpreting hospitality spaces as regenerative socio-spatial infrastructures capable of generating environmental, social and economic value in Alpine contexts. Through the analysis of regenerative tourism case studies and metadesign experimentations developed in degree theses, it investigates the role of design – particularly space-product-service systems – in shaping hybrid hospitality practices based on bottom-up processes, co-design and flexibility of use, identifying community-based hotels as a possible outcome. The paper contributes to the debate on contemporary mountain hospitality by proposing a theoretical and operational framework for regenerative tourism grounded in care, reciprocity and territorial regeneration.
