National Folk Museum of Korea

The National Folk Museum of Korea is the country's main museum of everyday life: how Koreans farmed, cooked, dressed, married, worshipped and were buried from prehistory to the present day. It stands inside the grounds of Gyeongbokgung Palace in central Seoul, on the eastern side of the palace, and many visitors reach it through the palace itself. The building is impossible to miss. Completed in 1972 as the home of the National Museum, it is a concrete reinterpretation of famous Buddhist temple architecture, with a five storey pagoda tower rising above terraces and a monumental staircase. The folk museum moved in during 1993.

Inside, three permanent halls tell the story in different ways. The first sets out the long history of Korean life; the second follows a year in a farming village through the seasons and the lunar calendar; the third follows a single life from birth through education, marriage and old age to the ancestral rites that continue after death. The displays mix real objects with life-size reconstructions and models, which makes the museum very approachable for visitors with no background in Korean history.

Outside, an open-air exhibition scattered across the grounds includes village guardian posts, stone figures, a relocated nineteenth century house and a full street of shops from the Seoul of the 1970s. A separate Children's Museum offers hands-on galleries. Admission is free, and an hour and a half is enough for the main halls, though the grounds reward a slower wander.