Kimpton Hotels celebrate Earth Day with ‘Plant Pals’ program
If checking into your luxurious Kimpton hotel room wasn’t enough, imagine your wake-up call including an Ostrich Fern in full bloom. Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants is honoring Earth Day — April 22, 2023 — by launching its Kimpton Plant Pals Program.
According to Travel Pulse, Kimpton is honoring Mother Earth with the first-of-its-kind collab that provides regionally sourced plants for guests to enjoy in-room, upon request. The IHG hotel hopes the new program will be an ethical and sustainable way to boost guests’ moods and increase productivity. They base their hypothesis on research that states there is an “innate biological and genetic connection between humans and nature, including an emotional dimension to this connection.”
If guests choose to be a “plant parent” during their stay, they can request their plant be placed in their room any time after check-in. It will even come with care tips. The Plant Pals program is part of the brand’s ESG commitment to source and support local, like-minded brands. Kimpton has tapped Plant Kween to be the voice of direction for the initiative. Plant Kween is a “Brooklyn-based Black, queer and non-binary author and influencer” specializing in plants and holistic wellness.
Along with the hotels, Plant Kween will curate a unique selection of region-based, native plants for each property to offer sustainably. Along with Plant Kween, the Kimpton properties worked with local vendors to source the appropriate plants that were native to their respective areas.
Travel Pulse shared some of the plants that will be available for guests at the 68 Kimpton hotels worldwide:
Guests checking into the Kimpton Hotel Monaco in Salt Lake City can check out foliage like the Maidenhair Fern, native to the Midwest region.
Guests at California properties, including Kimpton Canary Hotel in Santa Barbara or Kimpton Alton Hotel in San Francisco, can request a range of native plants, including White Sage and Prickly Pear Cactus.
Kimpton Hotel Palomar Philadelphia will feature Ostrich Ferns, while guests staying at the Kimpton Hotel Monaco Washington DC will find Plant Pal options like New York Ferns.
Guests staying at Kimpton’s Southern properties, like Miami’s Kimpton EPIC Hotel in Miami and Kimpton Seafire Resort + Spa in Grand Cayman, can choose from various tropical plants, including Coral Bells, Nevius Stonecrop, Southern Shield Fern and Saw Palmetto.
When traveling internationally, guests can enjoy such species as English Ivy and Baby’s Tears at European locations, like Kimpton Vividora Hotel in Barcelona, or Pothos, Ficus Audrey, and Chinese Evergreen plants at properties in the Asia/Pacific region, like Kimpton Shinjuku Tokyo.
Martie Bowser is a journalist and public relations professional in Charlotte, NC. She enjoys amplifying the voices of POC and women that fill a void within their community. Her bylines include “person of interest” interviews, small business highlights, pop culture commentary, entertainment features, and everything Beyonce.
This story was originally published March 20, 2023 at 9:20 AM with the headline "Kimpton Hotels celebrate Earth Day with ‘Plant Pals’ program."