Founder and Director of TemptingPlaces

April 2019

A serial entrepreneur and globetrotter

After graduating with a Master’s in Marketing & Communications, Laurence worked and travelled around the world for several years. She began her career in 1998 as a consultant in marketing and communications for international luxury hotel brands, before joining LVMH and the online bank Egg Banking PLC. Having travelled widely as a child with her parents, she was keen to develop a project in the hotel sector.
She launched TemptingPlaces in 2008, the first collection of outstanding boutique hotels in the world. Her pioneering brand in a growing global market met the expectations of a new generation of independent hotel owners. Today the hotel chain has enlisted over a hundred hotels across 31 countries, a feat she accomplished with the support of the Women Initiative Foundation and the mentoring program that has supported her since 2013.

Mentoring for success

After launching her hotel label, Laurence Onfroy felt the need to be supported in developing her business plan, and also to take a step back from her day-to-day activities and take a more measured look at her business. Once welcomed onto the WIF mentoring program, she set out the challenges she faced: 

opening up her capital and governance, internationalization, branding, and new projects such as her launching her book “60 unique destination, the most beautiful selection of boutique hotels throughout the world”. Martine Liautaud became her mentor in 2013, supporting her in this growth by sharing her network and her experience as well as the opportunity to participate in the Stanford program. “The Women Initiative Foundation program is a booster to get through key stages. For me it’s also a network of mentors and mentees that share and embody true entrepreneurial values: ambition, passion and humility. Beyond the advice and professional expertise, we also join WIF to be part of a benevolent and supportive community.”

On the way to a new WIF office in Singapore

The success of TemptingPlaces convinced Laurence to sell the company to the global hotel chain, Louvre Hotels Group, in January 2019.
Since 2018, Laurence has devoted herself to the Foundation and its activities, and notably contributed to the launch of the inter-company mentoring program in Europe. Her new ambition is to set up an Asian branch of WIF, so in July 2019 Laurence will move to Singapore to launch the Foundation’s activities and develop mentoring programs locally – a huge project that she will work on full-time.

To find out more about Laurence Onfroy, click here.