{"id":36483,"date":"2024-12-20T22:50:21","date_gmt":"2024-12-20T14:50:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/?p=36483"},"modified":"2026-03-10T17:30:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T09:30:21","slug":"day-14-seoul-dongdaemun-design-plaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/2024\/12\/20\/day-14-seoul-dongdaemun-design-plaza\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 14 @ Seoul – Dongdaemun Design Plaza"},"content":{"rendered":"

We didn’t know quite what to expect at the Dongdaemun Design Plaza<\/strong>, but we’d certainly heard that the place is a must-stop spot when in Seoul. We headed to the multi-purpose cultural complex in the early afternoon after our visit to the Starfield COEX Mall and Library: there are two options to get there, either by subway but involving at least one change in train line, or by a direct bus – number 301. We opted for the latter, and the ride took about 45 minutes compared to ~35 minutes by subway: but the bus ride was at least straightforward with minimum hassle.<\/p>\n

My first impression of the DDP? It looks like I’m walking underneath the saucer section of the USS Enterprise! The buildings are massive, and they house several facilities, including exhibition halls, design studios, and a shopping mall.<\/p>\n

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This was the second place we’d visited on Day 14 where we all went ‘wow’ on first impressions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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If you’re a Star Trek fan, you’d notice how strikingly similar the exterior coverings of the DDP buildings look to the exterior armor plating of the Federation starships in Star Trek.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The place apparently also has its own winter illumination. We didn’t get to see it though as this was an afternoon visit.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The pictures show how tiny humans are compared to the complex.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Reminds me of the Minton Bridge at home!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The exhibition halls were currently hosting several displays, including Colors Shapes Movements by Felice Varini, the French artist.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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You have to stand at specific spots and take pictures at specific angles to see the visual effect.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Optical sorcery!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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We debated whether this was a triangle, or a version of the Japanese national flag!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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This is actually a staircase leading down from the top floor.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A sculpture at the front entrance to the DDP. You have to stand at a specific spot in order to see the full human shape.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The design complex also has a number of really fun free interactive art and design exhibits. The kids especially had fun with this competitive activity: you jump on a trampoline and go as high as you can to get points. There were also others centered on generative AI imaging.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We really enjoyed our visit to the DDP, and spent 2 hours in it – we could have spent more if we could afford the time! The hall with the interactive design exhibits: one could easily spend at least an hour alone there to try everything. With hindsight, we should have stayed at the DDP even longer: because we left the DDP in the mid-afternoon to make our way to the Seoul Plaza Skating Rink only to find out that the place was already crowded with visitors. We ended up postponing our ice-skating activity to a different date – have to work out which one now. So, Day 14 was a fairly short day then, with us finishing the day with an early dinner back at Seoul Station Connect.<\/p>\n

Continued onto Day 15 tomorrow!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We didn’t know quite what to expect at the Dongdaemun Design Plaza, but we’d certainly heard that the place is a must-stop spot when in Seoul. We headed to the multi-purpose cultural complex in the early afternoon after our visit<\/p>\n

Read More Day 14 @ Seoul – Dongdaemun Design Plaza<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36553,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[684],"class_list":["post-36483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-traveling","tag-south-korea-2024","wpcat-17-id"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/blog-2024-korea-day-14-20241220_133915.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36483"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36483\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38146,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36483\/revisions\/38146"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}