SEOUL NEVER SLEEPS This contrast between the old and new Seoul is felt most strongly in Dongdaemun, a commercial neighborhood in the northeast of the city that boasts a wholesale market, much of the city’s clothing and design industry, a newly erected history park and the soon-to-open Dongdaemun Design Plaza, a project of Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid. I venture into the design plaza construction site with JB Park, the senior manager in charge of construction at DDP, and Eddie Can, Hadid’s man on the ground. It is high noon and quiet—only a few people wander aimlessly up and down the blocks, and there’s none of the energy found a couple of miles west in Myeongdong, a teenage shopping haven filled with young women clamoring for the latest eyewear, fashion and makeup.
Park leads me into the belly of the beast, an enormous, curved structure that sits on what was once a sports stadium and now stands out like an alien spaceship. “The old stadium was erected under Japanese occupation,” says Park. “And so it always had that association.” The original plan was to raze the stadium, expunging its ghosts, and create a cultural center for the city’s fashion and design industry. But when builders broke ground, they discovered that a whole section of Seoul’s ancient wall had been buried below the stadium. So instead, the city created a park to memorialize the archaeological remains, shrinking the footprint of the original Hadid project. After we exit the construction site, I have a coffee with Eddie Can. “This area is dead now,” he tells me. “You have to come back here at 2 a.m. That’s when Dongdaemun comes alive.”
mecca for superstar architects seeking marquee projects. This was especially true under its last mayor, Oh Se-hoon, who emphasized up-grading the look of the city, sometimes even, according to his critics, at the expense of health care and infrastructure. What makes Seoul right now such a dynamic and surprising locale is that it’s a place in flux on so many levels: The new architectural aspirations of the city are meeting—and sometimes clashing with—the bland uniformity of its past. Seoul residents are some of the earliest adopters of new technology in the world, especially cellphones and mobile computing devices, and their immediate access to the most up-to- date information means that the city’s hottest neighborhoods and sleepiest sections can change overnight.
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EC Magazines | Summer Edition 2022
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