Seoul forum to examine how personal taste turns into big business
Summary
The Seoul Design Foundation will hold the Seoul Design Learn Forum 2026 at Dongdaemun Design Plaza in central Seoul on Tuesday, examining how personal taste and changing consumer values can shape brands and businesses. Speakers from space design, fashion, publishing and food will discuss changing shopping habits and building businesses around personal style. About 250 startup founders, small business owners and university students are expected, with networking to follow.
Key Facts
- The forum will run from 2 p.m. to 6:10 p.m. in the Design Hall of Dongdaemun Design Plaza.
- The first session, Life at Reset, will examine how values-based purchasing is changing markets, spaces and everyday life.
- Yoo Jung-su, CEO of Glow Seoul, will discuss how changing shopping habits affect the market; the firm is known for revitalizing areas including Ikseon-dong.
- The Taste at Work session will feature Hwayo Group CEO Cho Hee-kyung, executives from W Concept and Low Classic, and a keynote by Cho.
- Registration through Event-us closes at 6 p.m. Monday, and the fee is 10,000 won ($7).
The Seoul Design Learn Forum 2026 participants join a lecture held at the Seoul Design Center in Seoul. Courtesy of Seoul Metropolitan Government
The Seoul Design Foundation will hold a forum next week on how personal taste and shifting consumer values can be turned into brands and businesses. Entrepreneurs and creators from space design, fashion, publishing and food will speak.
The Seoul Design Learn Forum 2026 runs from 2 p.m. to 6:10 p.m. on Tuesday in the Design Hall of Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP), the foundation said Wednesday. DDP is a landmark complex in central Seoul designed by the late architect Zaha Hadid.
Seoul Design Learn is a training program for people who want to start design businesses, offering hands-on classes, mentoring and networking. It applies the ideas behind Seoul Learn, the city’s main education platform, to design.
The first session, “Life at Reset,” will look at how people who buy based on their values are changing markets, spaces and everyday life. Yoo Jung-su will speak on how changing shopping habits affect the market. Yoo is CEO of Glow Seoul, a firm known for revitalizing areas such as Ikseon-dong in central Seoul.
The second session, “Taste at Work,” will feature founders and marketers who built businesses around their own sense of style. Cho Hee-kyung, CEO of Hwayo Group, will give the keynote speech. The group makes Hwayo, a premium Korean distilled liquor. Executives from the online fashion platform W Concept and the fashion brand Low Classic will also speak.
The forum ends with a panel discussion that includes novelist Park Sang-young, a publishing executive and food writer. Park’s novel “Love in the Big City” was nominated for the International Booker Prize and has been made into a film and a TV series.
About 250 people are expected, including startup founders, small business owners and university students. A networking session will follow.
Registration is open through Event-us until 6 p.m. Monday. The fee is 10,000 won ($7).
“We are building a practical support system that links education, mentoring, product reviews, investment and sales channels,” said Cha Kang-hee, CEO of the foundation.
This article was published with the assistance of generative AI and edited by The Korea Times.
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