Seoul to light up Myeong-dong with LEDs like Times Square

Shinsegae Department Store will hold a lighting ceremony Nov. 1 for the outdoor display board of its main store building

A media pole in Myeong-dong Square, a shopping district

Hae-Ryon Choi 1

Oct 23, 2024 (Gmt+09:00) haeryon@hankyung.com

Culture & Trends

Seoul will light up Myeong-dong, a bustling area with office workers and shoppers in the heart of the city, with 16 large outdoor digital billboards and 80 media poles to make it the Times Square of Korea.

Kim Kilsung, mayor of Seoul Jung-gu Office, said in a press conference on Wednesday that it will spend 170 billion won ($123 million) by 2033 to transform the area into the Myeong-dong Outdoor Advertising Free Display Zone.

The administrative office for the central district of Seoul will install 16 light-emitting diode (LED) displays on the exterior walls of commercial and office buildings, including those of Shinsegae Department Store and Lotte Department Store.

It will also build 80 street media poles in the district ranging from Euiji-ro subway station to Namdaemun to create a vivid tourism zone. Namdaemun is well-known for Namdaemun Market, a tourist attraction. The project got the nod of the Ministry of Interior and Safety last year.

Those electronic displays simultaneously releasing video content will create an immersive experience like virtual reality with spectacular night views, said Kim.

They will be first installed on the exterior walls of six buildings: Shinsegae Department Store’s main and new buildings, Lotte Young Plaza, the Hana Bank building, Kyowon Naeoe Building and the LDF Lotte Duty Free building.

Myeong-dong pedestrian street during a public holiday on Oct. 9, 2024

On Nov. 1, Shinsegae will hold a lighting ceremony for the 2,292.3-square-meter display board on the wall of its main department store building. The screen is 71.8 meters wide and 17.0 meters tall. It features an 8K resolution, or a width of 8,000 pixels.

"It is not simply installing an electronic board, but creating a new, virtual space that did not exist before," the mayor told reporters.

In the district, the Seoul Metropolitan Government is also building the lower platform of a gondola that will shuttle passengers from the base of Mt. Namsan to its top.

Write to Hae-Ryon Choi at haeryon@hankyung.com

Yeonhee Kim edited this article.