Meet our Experientialist® judges

Aisha and Lexie Shaibu-Lenoir
Aisha & Lexie are a married queer content-creator couple otherwise known as @thequeernomads. They are brand ambassadors for several travel brands including Belmond, Celebrity Cruises and Contiki. Their mission is to increase the visibility of queer women of colour in the travel industry and media, through their lived experiences, travelling across the world to showcase, feature and uplift marginalised voices through brands and companies that align with our values. As prominent queer members in the LGBTQ+ community, they make impact through the work we do with UK Black Pride and other community projects.

Amy Broomfield
Amy Broomfield is an editor for Harrods Magazines specialising in food, travel and interior design. She has also written for OutThere, The Telegraph and Conde Nast Traveller Middle East. 

Annie Fitzsimmons
Annie has covered all things travel for the last two decades across many platforms and in a constantly evolving media landscape. Her book, “National Geographic’s 100 Hotels of a Lifetime,” was published in December 2024 and distributed worldwide in multiple languages. She has worked with top media and travel brands, including at Embark Beyond – a $300 million travel agency with offices in New York and São Paulo – as Editor in Chief, AFAR Media, and Virtuoso. She held various roles over the course of almost a decade at National Geographic Travel, including luxury editor, editor at large, and the first and only Urban Insider, reporting on cities, culture, and people around the world.

Carmen Roberts
Carmen is an ward winning TV presenter on the BBC’s Travel Show with over 20 years international experience, presenting and reporting from more than 80 countries. She reported from the devastated resort town of Phuket after the Asian Tsunami in 2004, produced a programme aboard the world’s longest flight, filmed on board the world’s largest cruise ship, went behind the scenes of the world’s most efficient high-speed train service in Japan and reported from one of the world’s most secretive countries – North Korea.

Francisca Kellett
Francisca is the Travel Editor-at-Large for Country & Town House magazine, and was previously the Travel Editor at Tatler magazine. She writes for some of the world’s leading publications and is regarded as an industry expert on luxury and sustainable travel. She is also the Editor-in-Chief at Navigator International, a creative digital marketing agency for luxury travel brands.

Hollie-Rae Brader
Hollie-Rae is editor of luxury travel trade magazine Aspire. Since taking the helm at Aspire in 2016 she has significantly increased the magazine’s frequency and grown its distribution. To ensure the magazine is the leading title for luxury travel sellers she also introduced a string of networking and thought-leadership events and offers consumer marketing tools for her readers. Prior to joining Aspire, Hollie was deputy news editor and cruise reporter at sister title Travel Weekly.

Jeninne Lee-St. John Jeninne is Travel+Leisure South East Asia’s editor-in-chief, loves living in Bangkok, though she wishes it were also on a beach. She’s especially interested in food with a good backstory, new ways to define luxury, regenerative travel, wellness from ancient to cutting-edge, and weird wine. Jeninne worked at Time in New York and London, has a masters from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, and a bachelors from Williams College. Born in Washington, D.C., she’s lived in Southeast Asia since 2009, and is known among friends as the queen of bubbles.

Juliet Kinsman
Sustainability expert Juliet is an editor, journalist, speaker and consultant who shares stories to inspire impact. As founding editor of Mr & Mrs Smith, and a broadcaster, and author of many guidebooks, such as The Green Edit: Travel — Easy Tips for the Eco-Friendly Traveller (Ebury) and The Bucket List: Eco Experiences (Rizzoli), Juliet has shifted the narrative of boutique travel and sustainable luxury. Her purpose-led non-profit consultancy, Bouteco, works to amplify the impact of boutique eco-hotels and sustainable luxury brands, ensuring their efforts are celebrated authentically and free of greenwashing.

Mark Thompson
As a member of Authors Guild, the Society of American Travel Writers, and New York Travel Writers, as well as PEN America, Mark Thompson is an author and travel writer whose work has been published in numerous periodicals. As a novelist, he has been awarded fellowships and residencies at artists’ communities including MacDowell, Yaddo, and Blue Mountain Center. He earned a Ph.D. in American Studies with a dissertation that focuses on the myth of the frontier and the literature of 20^th-century California. He lives in Manhattan and Cape Cod.

Martin Perry
Martin is co-Founder and Creative Director of OutThere and heads up OutThere/Studio, the first-of-its-kind brand engagement agency that specialises in diverse and inclusive content for destinations and travel brands.

Meera Datani
Meera is a freelance travel and culture journalist, and executive editor at Adventure.com. Focusing on community-led tourism, food/cultural heritage, soft adventure, and wildlife/conservation, her bylines include National Geographic Traveller, Wanderlust, BBC Travel, Condé Nast Traveller, Evening Standard, and the i paper. In 2023, she founded a new platform – TravelWritingWebinars – to offer informal training to travel journalists, and is a former Chair/Board Director of the British Guild of Travel Writers.

Patrick Hamilton Courtney
Patrick is currently Content Editor, Hotels & Destinations at The Telegraph, and is a seasoned travel and arts writer who was previously travel editor at Homes & Gardens and Livingetc. His background as a writer of Thai heritage informs his editorial voice, and he specialises in stories about cultural and design-led experiences. He has recently contributed to titles including World of Interiors and Service95, amongst others.

Rupert Mellor
Rupert is OutThere’s Features Editor; and an award-winning editor, journalist, publishing consultant and communications expert with rich experience across print, online and emerging digital media. His extensive bylines includes all UK broadsheet newspapers, UK and international lifestyle and specialist periodicals.

Sonia Taourghi
Sonia is a freelance Luxury and Lifestyle Editor with a passion for people and photography. After a career in French television, radio, and digital media, Sonia found her way to London’s dynamic technology sector. Today, she combines these experiences with her love for luxury hospitality, chronicling the stories of exceptional places and the visionaries behind them, notably for Journal des Palaces.

Steffen Michels
Steffen is OutThere’s Digital Experientialist (Editor) and heads up all things online and social at the magazine.. He is passionate about authentic travel experiences, arts and culture, animal rights advocacy and environmentalism.

Susan d’Arcy
‘d’Arcy’ – as she’s known in the industry – is the luxury travel and wellness editor of The Times and Sunday Times and oversees the newspapers’ annual hotel and spa guides. She appears regularly on television and also works as a consultant on luxury travel and wellness projects.

Ute Junker
Ute is an award-winning travel writer, editor and podcaster. She has spent 20 years charting the evolution of luxury travel for a range of leading publications including the Centurion and Departures magazines, The Australian Financial Review, The South China Morning Post, T Australia: the New York Times Style Magazine and Delicious.

Uwern Jong
Uwern is co-Founder and Experientialist-in-Chief at OutThere, celebrating over a decade of publishing as an award-winning luxury and experiential travel journal rooted in diversity, discovery and discernment.