Seoul Metropolitan City develops architecture tour courses to show the architectural and cultural heritages which survived the turbulent period of the past 100 years under Korean Empire, Japanese ruling, and Korean War. The Seoul Architectural and Cultural Tour Map will offer information on 1,200 traditional, modern and contemporary buildings including the first Western style buildings for foreign ambassadors, or used as churches and schools, or single family detached houses, the very first apartments, and other modern and contemporary buildings designed by the first generation of Korean architects.
 

The map will shed light on the true value of Seoul’s architectural and cultural heritages, although it is also true that rash urbanization and industrialization has taken a toll on them. Seoul Metropolitan City explains this project will reevaluate the once ignored and forgotten architectural heritages during the past a few decades, and relate them to the hidden stories of pain and suffering written in history books. Actually, cities like Paris, Tokyo and Barcelona have been already distributing the architectural maps to promote the city’s architecture and culture. 

Once the database is built and the research is done by the Seoul Metropolitan City, major tour course for different themes will be developed based on major buildings with significant historical, cultural or artistic values. The tour courses will then be available as mobile apps or on the internet in a rather casual leaflet type of contents with photos, maps and stories are all thrown together. 
 

Although it might take about a year to finalize the project, the city officials expect the map project will help rediscover the true value of the city through the architectural buildings, which in turn will enhance the people’s recognition on cultural heritage and further help promote the city to foreign tourists. 
 

Jeansun Kim (press@whowired.com)