National Folk Museum of Korea - A Tower Borrowed From Temples

Photo: Ethan Doyle White, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)

A stop on Seoul Palaces, Bukchon and Insadong, a free self-guided tour.

On the east side of the palace grounds stands a building that looks like a stack of old temples - and that was exactly the idea. The architects borrowed from famous historic buildings around the country: the tall five-story tower on top echoes Palsangjeon, the wooden pagoda at Beopjusa Temple, and the stone stairs recall the bridges at Bulguksa Temple in Gyeongju. The building first housed the National Museum of Korea, and the folk museum moved in in 1993.

You do not need to go inside to enjoy it. Wander the outdoor grounds, where you will find copies of carved village spirit posts, stone piles for worship, old grinding mills and the pits where families buried kimchi jars to keep them cool through the seasons. Children usually love the circle of twelve stone zodiac animals - see if you can find the one for the year you were born.

If you come back another day, the galleries inside show how Koreans have lived, worked and celebrated through the year and through a lifetime.

Getting here: From Gyeonghoeru, head east across the northern part of the palace grounds; the museum's tall tower shows above the walls. It is about a five-minute walk.

Did you know?: Palsangjeon, the pagoda the tower copies, is the only wooden five-story pagoda left in Korea.

Photo op: Step back onto the open ground in front of the main stairs to fit the whole tiered tower into one frame.

More on Wikipedia: National Folk Museum of Korea · Beopjusa · Bulguksa

National Folk Museum of Korea - A Tower Borrowed From Temples

Stops on this tour