Experience Design in the 13th Century: The Case of Restaurants in Hangzhou
体验十三世纪设计—以杭州餐馆为例

Abstract

This exploratory investigation expands on the findings reported by Kiefer (2002) on the development of the restaurant trade in 13th-century Hangzhou. Pine and Gilmore (1998) coined the term experience economy to describe a shift from selling services to selling experiences. The concept of orchestrating experiences has become a new paradigm and attracted the attention of many scholars. In fact, many customer-centered organizations have successfully embraced this philosophy. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, we would like to further explore the various factors that made Hangzhou an ideal setting for restaurants. Secondly, we hypothesize that experiences were staged more than 700 years before the respective concepts were first mentioned by scholars.

早在十三世纪的中国，餐饮业就已在繁华的临安城崭露头角并迅速发展。衣食住行已不仅仅是人们生活的基本所需，更成为了服务业为顾客提供生活体验的契机。本文研究了中国古代南宋时期的都城——杭州的餐饮饮食文化，发掘使之成为理想餐饮起源地的主要因素，以及探索了其作为典型案例对七百年后现代学者首次提出的“体验经济”概念所具有的深远意义与影响。

Keywords:

• Hangzhou
• Southern Song
• cuisine
• economy
• experience
• service
• restaurant

Keywords:

• 杭州，南宋，饮食，经济，体验，服务，餐馆

Acknowledgment

The authors thank the interviewees Dr. Xu Jijun, a scholar from Zhejiang Academy of Social Sciences; Zhu Jiaji, General Manager of Hu Pan Ju; and Chef Yang from Shan Wai Zheng Wei Restaurant; as well as Heather Rule, staff coordinator at the School of Hospitality Administration at Boston University, for offering valuable suggestions.