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True New Yorkers know… cool can’t be manufactured (as much as people try). 

So when you’re running one of New York City’s standout boutique hotels, you can’t just chase trends, hope something sticks and think people will want to keep coming back time after time. You have to build something people can feel.

Richard Tucker, general manager of Arlo SoHo, has built his leadership around that principle. Authenticity, he believes, starts with how you treat the people behind the scenes. It’s an approach that’s shaped both the hotel’s reputation and Tucker’s own career in luxury hospitality, where he’s one of the few Black executives running a property at this level.

Tucker’s spent more than a decade in hospitality, working his way through properties like Fairmont, Rosewood, Thompson Hotels, and Highgate. He’s seen both ends of the scale, from small 21-room boutiques to massive hotels with over 400 rooms. All of that gave him different perspectives on how hotels operate before he got to Arlo SoHo.

In fact, his journey to the GM role wasn’t particularly glamorous at all. It was a lot of saying yes to things that didn’t come with a promotion or a raise. “Early in