On the 11th, in Unjung-dong, Bundang-gu, Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. As we entered the beginning of Unjung-ro, known as the "Pangyo furniture street" because furniture stores are clustered there, a store with a full glass façade that revealed its interior caught the eye. Inside, warm color-temperature lighting spread softly, and various interior materials such as tiles, wood flooring, and linoleum were densely displayed on the walls and tables.
A couple pushing a stroller picked up flooring samples one by one, feeling the texture and comparing them. A store employee explained the characteristics of each material and the construction methods alongside them.
This is "Ohouse Interior Pangyo Lounge," the first offline interior hub unveiled by the lifestyle platform Ohouse. Having grown mainly online, Ohouse created the space as part of its O2O (Online to Offline) strategy to strengthen its interior business in earnest. After a soft opening in January, it began full operations earlier this month.
Ohouse operates a platform that connects interior specialists with customers. Late last year, it established a subsidiary, "Ohouse Construction," specializing in partial renovations such as kitchens and bathrooms, and also completed registration as a specialized contractor.
Unlike furniture or household goods, interiors are often a field where consumers check materials and consult experts before making decisions, making fully online transactions difficult. A person at Ohouse said, "This space is designed so that visitors can check physical details that are hard to verify on a screen, and we created the Pangyo lounge to improve consumers' access to interiors."
Inside the store, a hands-on space was set up to recreate an actual kitchen centered on Ohouse's kitchen construction brand, "Ohouse Kitchen." Visitors can see real kitchen layouts, storage methods, and finishes, allowing them to more concretely envision the post-construction result.
The store also lets visitors touch and compare more than 150 types of interior materials, including tile, wood flooring, linoleum, and wallpaper. In particular, in collaboration with the smart lighting brand "Aqara," it created a separate area where people can see how materials feel different in a space as brightness changes. An on-site representative explained, "Even the same material can create a different overall mood or perceived feel depending on the type of lighting at home, so we set it up so customers can check it under lighting conditions similar to their actual living environments."
Ohouse is also opening the Pangyo lounge for estimate consultations between customers and interior specialists. It extended the consultation and matching features that had taken place on the online platform into an offline space. Visitors can check materials, consult with experts, and flesh out construction plans and estimates. Because consultations take place in a neutral platform space rather than a specific company's office, the company said customers can feel a sense of trust that they are receiving advice in a more objective environment.
Ohouse chose Pangyo as its first regional offline hub for the interior business because it judged related demand to be strong. Based on Ohouse's own analysis of interior construction consultation demand on its platform, the number of consultations in southern Gyeonggi Province was tallied at more than twice that of major Seoul areas such as Gangnam and Songpa. An analysis of apartment sales volume data from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport also showed that transaction volume in southern Gyeonggi was about 1.5 times higher than in core Seoul areas such as Gangnam and Songpa.
The Pangyo Unjung-dong area where the Pangyo lounge opened has formed what is known as a "furniture street," with furniture and interior stores clustered together. The area is close to new towns such as Pangyo, Bundang, and Yongin, and is also cited as a place where remodeling and new interior demand steadily flows in.
An Ohouse representative said, "We determined that interior demand driven by active apartment resale cycles is most concentrated in southern Gyeonggi, so we chose southern Gyeonggi for our first store," adding, "By opening on Pangyo's furniture street, where related stores are clustered, we also improved customer accessibility."
Since the official opening earlier this month, weekend foot traffic at the Ohouse Pangyo lounge has increased two to three times compared with the soft opening period. Starting with the Pangyo lounge, Ohouse plans to expand its offline touchpoints to major areas including Seoul.
An Ohouse representative said, "We will continue to enhance the consultation and construction experience that links online and offline so customers can feel secure starting their interior projects."