About Us

We engineer service standards into experiences guests feel, remember, and return for.

About Atelier 5 Star

At the heart of Atelier is Luxury Intelligence™ the framework created by Gershwin to develop Presence, Perception, Precision, Poise, and Purpose in service. Dolly’s perspective in people development and modern hospitality, including her service on Airbnb’s Host Advisory Board, helped shape Atelier’s human-centered vision. Today, Atelier is strengthened by an executive and advisory team that adds practical, academic, and creative depth.
Florent Gateau brings the perspective of the hotelier in practice.
Professor Peter Jones, MBE, adds intellectual and hospitality thought leadership, and Damian Veloz of Veloz Media Agency strengthens the brand through visual storytelling, audio, and social media strategy.

Together, we help turn standards into habits, habits into performance, and performance into culture. Because luxury is not a checklist. It is a way of operating.
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Our Position
We Are Not a Training Company.
We Engineer Service Culture.

Atelier 5 Star was founded by Dolly Duran, MBA, and Dr. Gershwin Narraidoo from a shared belief that luxury service should not live only in training manuals, workshops, or audits. It should be visible in what teams do every single day. With backgrounds in business, human resource management, hospitality, higher education, and operational excellence, they created Atelier to help organizations move beyond teaching standards and begin living them through daily practice, leadership reinforcement, and disciplined execution.

Executive Team

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Dr. Gershwin Narraidoo

COO
Founder

Florent Gateau

Hotelier Advisor

Dolly Duran, MBA

CEO
Co-founder

Damian Veloz

Executive Producer

Professor Peter Jones MBE

Education Advisor

Savoir - Knowledge

Understanding Excellence

We develop savoir by building the understanding, judgement, and awareness required for exceptional hospitality. In a world where information is easy to access, what matters is the ability to interpret standards with intelligence, purpose, and human understanding. Guided by Perception and Purpose, learners come to understand not only what excellence looks like, but why it matters and how it shapes the guest experience. This reflects the view that hospitality is, above all, a relational and human craft.

Savoir Faire - Doing 

Executing Excellence

We develop savoir-faire through disciplined practice, daily execution, and leadership reinforcement. Luxury service is not mastered in theory alone. It is refined on the floor through repetition, observation, coaching, role plays, pre-shifts, and real-time feedback. Guided by Presence, Perception, and Precision, learners strengthen their ability to translate standards into elegant, consistent action. This is further sustained through our Luxury Intelligence Certification, where managers learn to become coaches on the floor, reinforcing the daily doing of service so standards are not simply taught, but practiced every day.

Savoir-Être - Being

Embodying Excellence

We develop savoir-être by helping individuals embody the mindset, presence, and intentionality that define true luxury service. Excellence is not only what is done, but how it is carried and felt by the guest. Guided by Presence, Perception, and Purpose, learners strengthen the qualities that make service appear natural, poised, and deeply authentic. Through coaching, observation, role plays, pre-shifts, and real-time feedback, these behaviors are reinforced until standards move beyond instruction and become part of one’s professional identity. This is further sustained through our Luxury Intelligence Certification, where managers learn to coach on the floor and cultivate cultures in which excellence is not simply taught, but lived.

Sales Team

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Travis 

Sales Representative South Africa

Lise 

Sales Representative Mauritius 

Craftsmanship, Artistry, & Excellence

Inspired by centuries of mentorship and mastery.

Historical Painting
Atelier d’Ary Scheffer, rue Chaptal (1851)
Arie Johannes Lamme (Dutch, 1812-1900)

What is an Atelier?

An atelier, derived from the French word for "workshop" or "studio," refers to the private workspace of a professional artist, where the master collaborates with assistants, students, and apprentices to produce art under the master's guidance. 

Historical Roots

The atelier tradition has deep roots in apprenticeship. From ancient Greece to medieval guilds and later the French ateliers of the 19th century, mastery was developed through close mentorship, disciplined practice, and learning by doing. Most notably in architecture and fine arts, the atelier became a model where students refined their craft under the guidance of accomplished masters.

Our Artistic Vision

Ateliers are defined by mentorship, hands-on learning, and the direct transmission of craft from master to student. They refine skill, vision, and discipline through practice and guidance. That is the ambition of Atelier 5 Star—to cultivate mastery through immersive, personalized learning.

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