ENIn this article the first insights of the study are presented where the transformations of heritage and place in different tourism areas were researched. While adapting to the global challenges it is necessary for tourism researchers actively seek and provide a broad range of perspectives on tourism development that offer opportunities for sustainability, human prosperity and ecological recovery. Thus, the purpose of the research is to conduct a study of the experiences of smart tourism development in regions and to create a grounded theory (GT) that can show us the new ways of developing tourism. This research is conducted following classic grounded theory methodology, that specifies all the research path. Summarizing the initial results of the grounded theory (GT) methodology development in the research, it was made an insight that the main concern of the interviewed tourism developers was PLACE, and it determined how the research participants addressed the main concern, i.e. their decisions about how and what to build, how to deal with that future/existing object were dictated by the PLACE. Thus, was discovered one of the most important concerns of place transformations on the basis of the methodology of the grounded theory - transformative placemaking. Keywords: tourism, place, heritage, transformation, grounded theory. [From the publication]