That's kind of a niche topic in architecture schools so I'd imagine the best way to do it is to find faculty that are engaged in the study of branding in architecture.

Peggy Deamer and Anna Klingmann are two high profile examples that I'm betting you may have already read for your thesis project. At Michigan, Jennifer Harmon teaches studios and seminars on the subject. Jeffrey Inaba at Columbia does high profile work for retail and commercial clients that deals with immersion. The trick is to dig deep.

Even is faculty isn't explicitly researching the topic you're looking for I think a lot of them are inherently trying to understand and reinterpret society and culture.

Thank you for your response. 

Yes, I looked up Anna Klingmann for my thesis, will look up the works of Peggy Deamer, Jennifer Harmon and Jeffrey Inaba as well.

On probing this topic a little further, I realized that if one looks for application of design in the realm of business, one inevitably comes across design strategy management (of the likes offered at Parsons) and the works of firms like IDEO.

So looking at my options, I can either pursue my masters in architecture>choose courses, professors and a research topic in  the direction of architecture and branding>work in firms as set up by Anna Klingmann in New York.

Or my other option would be to specialize in say strategic design management>work in firms like IDEO. 

But in the second scenario, I'm not sure if this jump is premature and that I should get better design experience and then narrow down to strategic design management.

Looking forward to any thoughts on this topic.

Looks like you have some soul searching to do. It depends on where you see yourself in the future.

For example did you look at IDEO (and the like) designers' CVs to see where and how they were educated? If a bunch of them came in with architecture backgrounds that seems like a solid indication that you'll be able to successfully transition between disciplines.

Architecture firms that do branding (Snohetta being a high profile example) would probably look favorably upon an arch / branding person since you'd potentially be useful in both departments. However, the down side to this of course is that they may see you as too inexperienced in branding and may prefer to hire a specialist.