Citizens excited about refurbished Gwanghwamun Square

Seoul's Gwanghwamun Square was unveiled after 19 months of renovation, Saturday. The opening ceremony was held later the same day. Yonhap

Gwanghawmun transformed from square surrounded by traffic lanes to urban park

By Ko Dong-hwan

A woman and her teenage son at the new Gwanghwamun Square were upbeat as they found themselves among hundreds of people there to see the country's symbolic landmark unveiling its new look on Saturday. Despite their face masks, one could see looks of wonder in their eyes. Amid the raging heat wave, they explored a media performance on a building facade in front of Gwanghwamun Station's exit 9 as well as water jets shooting from the pavement to form a vaulted tunnel high enough for an adult to walk under.

"It looks much safer now, definitely okay to take kids to," said the woman from Daegu. One of the biggest changes to the square involved filling in Saejong-daero Road, which had separated the square from the street block to its west, with an additional tree-planted promenade, making the square bigger and greener.

Another pair of friends strolling the park said they were happy to be able to visit the square when they might want to enjoy the media performances around the refurbished square. "I liked most the convenient access to this place that never closes, being able to check out the heritage and all," one of the girls, from Seoul's Jung District, said. She was referring to the remains of an office of national audit and inspection from the Goryeo and Joseon periods that were unearthed on the site during the renovation. They are on display at the site where they were discovered, in a sunken area, 1.2 meters in depth.

Saturday saw the two-and-half-hour opening ceremony for the renovated square starting at 7 p.m. Three hundred members of the public, who had a 1-in-18 chance of being selected from a pool of 5,271 people who signed up to attend the ceremony, were there in front of the main stage set up at the square in Seoul's central district of Jongno.

Among the crowd was Mayor Oh Se-hoon, in a white suit and looking elated as he addressed the onlookers from the stage.

Media projections on the facade of the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts show the Kim Chang-wan band performing during the square's opening ceremony on Saturday. Yonhap

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"This is the moment when the Korean capital's proudest landmark has revealed itself," said Oh during his speech for the opening ceremony. "I am really excited. It's like unwrapping an awesome new product for customers."

Oh had actually wanted to scrap the renovation project, which began under previous Mayor Park Won-soon in November 2020, ordering a review of the project in April 2021 after he was elected in the Seoul mayoral by-election.

This Saturday, Oh told the crowd he recalled in 2009, when he had introduced the new area in front of Gwanghwamun Gate ― which was undergoing disassembly to be moved 14.5 meters to the south at the time ― to the public for the first time during his first Seoul mayoral term. Gwanghwamun Plaza was then in the middle of more than a dozen traffic lanes on Sejong-daero. The statues of Yi Sun-shin and King Sejong had been previously isolated in the major thoroughfare that extends south from in front of Gyeongbok Palace, and had been given more spacious footing on a large asphalt island. Yet, some had still complained about the roads that surrounded the square, saying that the pedestrian area wasn't big enough for strolling. The lack of convenient facilities was another shortcoming raised by observers.

"Now the square looks closer to what I had envisioned in 2009, when I had thought, as the place was shaping up, that the roads around the square would someday turn into a promenade," said the mayor. "CNN and BBC used to deliver TV news reports in front of the Eiffel Tower. Now, we can do the same here at the new square, as we deliver our local news to the global audience."

In a press interview conducted shortly before the ceremony, Oh confirmed his controversial view that he won't tolerate any protests or public gatherings that disrupt the square's peaceful order now that the place has become more accessible to the public. "It's not that I will control certain protests based on their political messages," said Oh. "It's just that we want to rein in people who carry out public gatherings differently from what they originally describe in their applications to the city government for use of the square."

Seats at the Saturday ceremony were also filled by Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, Seoul Metropolitan Council Chairman Kim Hyeon-ki, Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education Governor Cho Hee-yeon, Cultural Heritage Administration President Choi Eung-cheon and Seoul Metropolitan Police Chief Kim Kwang-ho. Lawmakers and ambassadors from 17 embassies in the city also attended the event, as live bands and an orchestra performed. The visitors who weren't selected to have seats at the ceremony packed the stairs that lead up to the main entrance of the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts that once stood across Saejong-daero from the square.

Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon greets people gathered at the renovated square during the opening ceremony on Saturday. Yonhap

A historically symbolic public gathering space for various purposes ― from protests to concerts, exhibitions and parades ― Gwanghwamun Square's latest renovation was spearheaded in 2020 by late Mayor Park Won-soon.

The renovated square is 40,300 square meters in size, more than double the size of the previous one at 18,840 square meters. The long rectangular space's width has also been extended from 35 meters to 60 meters, becoming more spacious. Five thousand newly planted trees, including 300 tall ones, have increased the square's green space from 2,839 square meters to 9,367 square meters, providing more cover from the sunlight in summer.

The squares increase in size also means more public space for demonstrations and protests. The city government has designated the 5,275 square meters of the square's northern lawn and the open space in front of the bronze statue of King Sejong at the square's center for public activities, which is 1.3 times bigger than the previously delineated area. The free space for unplanned activities also more than doubled from 14,840 to 35,025 square meters.

With the square now grouped together at the western side, the entire square is now closer to the entrances of the Sejong Center, Sejongno Park and the Government Complex of Seoul.

In front of the Sejong Center are hundreds of fountains shooting jets of water in unison in the shape of a 40-meter-long tunnel or the letters of Hangul, the Korean writing system created in the 1400s by King Sejong. Behind the King Sejong statue is a media display panel showcasing various media art, including depictions of the achievements of King Sejong and Admiral Yi Sun-shin, taekwondo, and the works of artists.