For over fifteen years, Lyon Parc Auto has been building parking buildings which are designed as services to male and female motorists, and not only as simple car storage towers. These car parks, designed by pluri-disciplinary teams (structural architects, interior architects, artists, graphic designers – signposting specialists, environmental designers), with a polysensorial approach, are visited today by specialists from the world over, have been awarded the “grand Prix Européen du Design” (European Design Award), and are used as an example in the “D.Day, design today” exposition at the Georges Pompidou Centre in Paris. The objective of this communication is twofold: to present the reasons behind the success of these innovative projects and to deconstruct the model of reception and of the user that these projects implicitly integrate. The theoretical contributions will essentially come from the sociology of practices which integrate a methodology stemming from sociosemiotics.