Seonyudo Park: Seoul's former water-treatment plant turned into a garden on the Han River

In the middle of the Han River, between the Yeouido and Hapjeong districts, there is a small island that for much of the twentieth century was anything but a place of leisure. Seonyudo was home to a quarry opened during the Japanese colonial period and, from the 1970s, to a water-treatment plant that supplied drinking water to the southwestern part of Seoul. The plant was closed in 2000. Instead of demolishing it, the municipality chose to keep its concrete skeleton and let the vegetation reclaim it: in 2002 Korea's first regenerated ecological park was born this way.

The park

The result is a space of about 110,000 square metres where the old industrial structures are not hidden but put on display. The reservoirs and sedimentation basins have become water gardens and pools for aquatic plants; the concrete walls act as supports for climbers and ferns. The most photographed corner is the "Garden of Green Columns", where the remaining pillars of the former filtration plant are covered in ivy and form a kind of vegetal colonnade. There is also a greenhouse with over 200 plant species, an aquatic botanical garden, the so-called "garden of time", a gallery devoted to the Han River and the Seonyujeong pavilion overlooking the water.

The name and the history

The name itself tells the earlier story of the place: "Seonyu" denotes a place of scenic beauty, and in the past the island was a destination for Confucian scholars who came here to write poems and paint. That contemplative identity, lost with the quarry and the treatment plant, has in a sense returned. The atmosphere is post-industrial and silent: raw concrete, still water, reed beds, and in the background the Yeouido skyline, seen best especially at sunset, when the skyscrapers light up on the other side of the river.

It is one of the few green spaces in Seoul to remain secluded, partly because it is not a "picnic" park like the enormous Hangang Park or the lawns of Yeouido: people come more to walk among the structures and gardens than to lie on the grass. For this reason, especially on a weekday morning, you can wander it almost alone. Weekends and the middle of the day are livelier.

How to get there

How to get there. The simplest way is Line 9 of the metro, Seonyudo station, exit 2: from there you follow the signs for the Seonyudo pedestrian bridge and cross it on foot to reach the island, about ten minutes in all. Alternatively, from Line 2 you get off at Dangsan (exit 1) and continue with one of the buses that stop near the bridge. The address is 343 Seonyu-ro, Yeongdeungpo-gu.

Practical information

Hours and practical advice. The park is open every day from 6:00 to midnight; the exhibition hall keeps more restricted hours (about 9:00-18:00, closed on Mondays). Admission is free. Allow a couple of hours: it is not a full-day destination, and it pairs well with a walk along the Yanghwa Hangang Park or a stop at the Mangwon market, on the opposite bank. Comfortable shoes: you walk a fair amount among paths, ramps and gardens. Spring and autumn are best for the outdoor vegetation, but the greenhouse makes the place interesting in any month.

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