This year, the House of Beautiful Business turns 10.
We’re marking this milestone by renewing our mission: to shape a humanist future in and through business, in partnership with AI, and for the benefit of all life on earth
The World Beautiful Business Forum brings together those who dream bigger, aim higher, and long for more than efficiency and growth — and are ready to explore what a more-than-human future could feel like.
An invitation for the boldest, most original, most whimsical minds across disciplines to think, feel, and do business beyond business
The Olympia City Theater Maria Callas, with a capacity of 750 seats, is a cultural jewel in the heart of Athens. Originally built in the mid-20th century and recently restored, the neoclassical venue now bears the name of Greece’s most celebrated soprano. It will serve as the home of our main-stage program, hosting five central acts loosely inspired by the structure and spirit of Greek drama. The upper floor—charmingly referred to as the “Piano Bar”—will offer a more intimate setting for select sessions, discussions, and musical interludes.
In addition to the Theater main-stage acts, the World Beautiful Business Forum will take place in several other venues (to be announced soon) distributed across Athens.
All venues are culturally significant sites located in the heart of the city, each within a 15-minute walk of the others. Between sessions, participants can also join over a dozen curated walks through Athens, part of our AI Democracy Marathon and other immersive excursions.
On our closing day, Sunday, we will leave the city and gather on the Athenian Riviera.
Our Partners
FAQ
The House of Beautiful Business is the network for the life-centered economy. Our mission is to create a new kind of business that is more purposeful, inclusive, and sustainable, in one word: beautiful. Thought leadership-driven, community-powered, and experience-based, we bring together business leaders, economists, policy-makers, technologists, scientists, artists, and activists through in-person gatherings, online programs, consulting, publications, performances, and art. We inspire and enable them to shape an economy that honors all forms of life.
Founded in 2017, the House has grown from a pop-up event to a platform comprising learning and development experiences, an annual festival, local events, and a community of more than 30,000 professionals worldwide. We are a distributed team with staff in Berlin, Istanbul, Barcelona, and Atlanta. Our clients include numerous Fortune 500 companies including Accenture, Accor, Ageas, Audi, BCG, Chanel, Deloitte, Deutsche Telekom, E.ON, EY, Google, Hotwire, Hubert Burda Media, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Otto Group, Porsche, PwC, Salesforce, Santander, SAP, Sky, Volkswagen Group, and others. Our seed investor is Porsche. In 2025, we partnered with the Acosta Institute and The Holon Institute to run The PolyOpportunity as a year-long nonprofit initiative with gatherings in Berlin, New York, Tangier, and Istanbul.
The World Beautiful Business Forum is our 10th annual gathering and marks our 10-year anniversary.
Taking place in Athens on May 7-10, 2026, the World Beautiful Business Forum will be the most human festival for the more-than-human world: a gathering for those who dream bigger, aim higher, and long for more. An invitation for the boldest, most original, most whimsical minds from business, technology, science, public sector, the humanities, and the arts to think, feel, and do business beyond business. In a metacrisis, post-Anthropocene era defined by accelerating AI, ecological collapse, and social division, the World Beautiful Business Forum aims to debut fresh ideas, language, and practices to navigate and influence the fractured new realities taking shape at breakneck speed. As the 10th annual gathering hosted by the House of Beautiful Business, it will be both a celebration of a decade of our work and what’s next, a “best-of” and “future-of,” a reunion and a point of departure. You can also read more about our vision for the Forum here.
Bring them!
Bringing together 750 participants from all around the world, the program of the World Beautiful Business Forum will feature five Acts (five main-stage sessions over the course of four days, loosely inspired by the ancient Greek drama) and a number of Pavilions that are each devoted to a specific issue or question. We will reveal more details in the coming weeks and months. In the meantime, here’s an outline of the agenda:
We recommend you arrive on Wednesday, May 6, and depart no earlier than Sunday, May 10.
Thursday, May 7 begins with guided city tours, continues with programming in pop-up spaces and pavilions across the city, including the launch of the AI Democracy Marathon, and concludes with the mainstage opening session in the evening.
Friday, May 8 offers full immersion: morning rituals, all-day pavilions, mainstage sessions, breakout sessions, curated dinners, and late-night “living room” salons throughout the city.
Saturday, May 9 blends depth and discovery—with more pavilion programming, half-day main-stage sessions, hands-on workshops, and citywide excursions—culminating in a closing party.
Sunday, May 10 creates space for a gentle landing, with a community brunch and integration sessions before departure.
The House of Beautiful Business is known for its innovative, immersive experiences. Our events are ideas festivals rather than conventional business conferences. They are not polite. There will be no self-promotion, no platitudes. Instead of PowerPoints, we host deep conversations, silent dinners, ideation walks, simulations, social experiments, public readings—even football matches. Instead of panels, we convene long-form debates in intimate and expansive formats, and we go into the field. Music, dance, and theater are not sideshows — they are central to the program. We draw from a rich tapestry of intelligences, disciplines, and cultures. We eschew tidy frameworks and predefined outcomes in favor of complexity, paradox, and the most audacious ideas — including those that resist resolution. To get a sense of the kind of moments we create, take a look at highlights from our 2023 festival in Sintra, our 2024 festival in Tangier, and our 2025 festival in Tangier.
The pass grants you access to all programming, including four days of main-stage and breakout sessions, experiential spaces, and social activities. Note that travel, accommodation, food, and beverages are on you.
We offer four ticket types to reflect different types of buyers. The Nonprofit Pass (€1,095) is for individuals representing registered nonprofit organizations, foundations, or public institutions. We believe in supporting mission-driven work. The Small Business Pass (€1,495) is for freelancers, founders, and companies with fewer than 50 employees. If you’re building something beautiful with limited resources, this one’s for you. The Standard Pass (€1,895) is for participants from larger organizations or those with the means to support the full cost of the Forum experience. The Welcome Pass (€395) is exclusively for residents of Greece as a token of gratitude for welcoming the House to their country for the first time.
Your support helps make this gathering possible for everyone. No matter which ticket you choose, the experience is the same: full access to all programming.
Special rates might be available for larger groups. Please check this website for the latest ticketing information and offers—or reach out to us at community@houseofbeautifulbusiness.com in case you have any questions.
Additionally, thanks to the revenue generated from regular ticket sales, we’re able to offer a limited number of Stipends for those who need financial support to attend the World Beautiful Business Forum. The Stipend grants access to a full-program pass for €295 (excluding food, beverages, and accommodation). To apply, please send us a short email to community@houseofbeautifulbusiness.com explaining why you’re requesting support.
The World Beautiful Business Forum takes place in Greece, we are required by law to apply 24% Greek VAT to all ticket purchases. Kindly note that VAT is not included in the listed price, but is added at checkout to ensure full transparency and legal compliance.
We accept payments with credit cards via this website. Other payment solutions, such as wire transfers, are available upon demand — please reach out to community@houseofbeautifulbusiness.com.
Athens is both the epitome of nostalgia and a laboratory for the future. A crossroads of East and West, economic ambition and social complexity, grandeur and grit. Athens has seen it all and sees it all: Old and new empires. Democracy and dictatorship. Tragedy and farce. Extreme beauty and extreme ugliness. Philosophy and praxis. The world’s first computer (“Antikythera”), the oldest known automation devices, and seminal ideas for a “network of the mind” (the “noosphere,” the ancient foundation for what we would now call Superintelligence). Athens is distinctively European, genuinely cosmopolitan — and booming, including a vibrant arts and startup scene. We can’t think of a more whimsical, a more humanist and metaphysical place — close to our desires, close to the gods — to prepare us for a more-than-human world: and make it beautiful.
Athens is well connected to most regions around the world. The easiest way to reach the city is by flying into Athens International Airport (ATH), which serves direct flights from most European capitals, as well as major hubs in North America, the Middle East, and Asia. From the airport, the city center is a 30–40 minute ride by taxi, metro, or airport express bus.
Our main venue, the Olympia Theatre Maria Callas, is located in the heart of Athens (Akadimias 59, Athina 106 79), and most of the pavilions will be within 20 minute walking distance from it. We will confirm the locations of the pavilions soon.
Athens offers a wide range of accommodation options across all categories, from budget to boutique to luxury. We’ve published an official Accommodation Guide to help you find the perfect place to stay during the gathering.
Please note though that our main venue, the Olympia Theatre Maria Callas, is located in the heart of Athens (Akadimias 59, Athina 106 79), and most of the pavilions will be within 20 minute walking distance from it, so we suggest you stay in the center as well.
Our events have attracted attendees from more than 40 countries, who are diverse in terms of gender, age, culture, and professional background. Our audience ranges from CEOs, nonprofit leaders, policy-makers, artists, academics, and technologists to freelancers, entrepreneurs, and activists. Many members of our community find themselves at inflection points in their careers or lives, and are looking for new inspiration and orientation. Some use our gatherings to meet interesting people, expose themselves to fresh ideas, and broaden their community. Others consider it a place to access original thinking, next-generation technologies, and novel practices to spur innovation efforts within their organization. What all participants in our events have in common is the quest to shape and build a life-centered economy. Everyone comes with an inquisitive mind, a big heart, and a desire for real, honest connections.
At our previous gatherings, we welcomed guests from many of the world’s leading organizations, including Accenture, Accor, Adidas, Ageas, Airbnb, Airbus, Amazon, Apple, Audi, Bayer, BCG, Beiersdorf, beta-i, BMW, Bosch, Care, Chanel, Circular Unity, Coca-Cola, Deloitte, Deutsche Bahn, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom, Diconium, Enel, EY, Farfetch, Fast Company, Fortune, Foresight Academy, FPF, frog design, Galp, Google, Greenpeace, Groupe PSA, H&M, Hotwire, Hubert Burda Media, HSBC, Hugo Boss, IDEO, Impact Hub, Indeed Innovation, Infineon, Inner Development Goals, Journee, Kienbaum, Korn Ferry, Kyu, LinkedIn, Lufthansa, LVMH, Mercedes, Merck, More in Common, Microsoft, Neol, NHSA, Nike, Otto Group, Philips, Pfizer, Porsche, PwC, RWE, Salesforce, Santander, SAP, Sea Watch, Siemens, Sky, Süddeutsche Zeitung, SYPartners, TED, The DO, The Guardian, UEFA, UN, UNICEF, Volkswagen Group, Walmart, WEF, Wikimedia, Wired, WWF, Zalando, among others. Additionally, we are working with partners to involve the local businesses and creative communities of Athens.
We welcome passionate individuals who wish to make a contribution. If you’re interested in volunteering or getting involved in any other capacity, please fill in our Volunteer Form and we will get back to you.
Yes, we offer various sponsorship and partnership opportunities. Please reach out to collaborate@houseofbeautifulbusiness.com if you are interested in exploring this further.
