A Study on Corporate Space Design Based on the 4Es Experience Framework

(Background and Purpose) Recent corporate competition has expanded beyond the differentiation of products and services toward brand experience strategies centered on building relationships with consumers. Within this context, corporate spaces function as key mediators for delivering brand philosophy and values in an experiential manner. This role is particularly emphasized in the automotive industry, where technological information and emotional immersion are simultaneously required. However, existing studies tend to analyze corporate spaces primarily from the perspectives of organizational culture or work environments, while systematic analyses grounded in brand experience strategies remain limited. Accordingly, this study aims to examine how brand experiences are spatially structured and adjusted within corporate spaces in the automotive industry, based on Pine and Gilmore's 4Es experience framework. (Method) This study establishes an analytical framework by reinterpreting Pine and Gilmore's 4Es experience factors from a spatial design perspective, grounded in a review of experience economy theory and brand experience literature. Qualitative case studies were conducted on selected domestic and international automotive brand corporate spaces. The analysis focused on how entertainment, education, esthetics, and escapism are implemented through spatial devices and operational strategies, comparing the intensity and structural roles of each experiential factor within the spaces. (Results) The findings reveal that brand experiences in automotive corporate spaces are not implemented through an equal application of the four experiential factors; rather, they are selectively combined and hierarchically structured according to brand strategy and the functional role of the space. In particular, esthetic experience functions not merely as one experiential element but as a spatial precondition that enables brand experience to operate. In contrast, entertainment, educational, and escapist experiences emerge as flexible elements that are adjusted according to the values conveyed by the brand and its communication strategy. These results suggest that, in automotive corporate spaces, the strategic arrangement and prioritization of experiential elements are more critical than their quantitative expansion. (Conclusions) Through case studies in the automotive industry, this research identifies corporate space as a strategic platform in which brand experience is structured and mediated. It proposes that corporate space design is not an aggregation of individual experiential devices, but a strategic design act that establishes a hierarchy of experience factors based on brand values and ensures aesthetic consistency. This study contributes to extending brand experience discourse from marketing-centered approaches to a spatial design framework where experiences are systematically organized and interpreted. Nevertheless, as this research is based on qualitative case studies within a specific industry, future studies should incorporate a broader range of industries, spatial typologies, and user-based empirical analyses to further validate the multi-layered relationship between corporate space and brand experience.