“Hotel Del Luna” (Studio Dragon) via The Korea Herald/Asia News Network
SEOUL — Foreigners flocked to famous K-drama filming sites in Seoul last year, propelled by a rising global popularity for Korean TV series, a report showed Friday.
Among some 80 tourist attractions visited by 1.6 million foreigners last year, 57.6 percent were filming locations of Netflix-aired Korean dramas, a LG Uplus report showed.
Milal Fine Art Museum in Gangnam-gu, the filming site of “Guardian: The Lonely and Great God,” saw a 195 percent surge — the highest figure — in the number of foreign visitors compared to 2020.
C156 Underground, a restaurant in Gwangjin-gu where “Hotel Del Luna” and “My ID is Gangnam Beauty” were filmed, saw a 178 percent increase in foreign visitors.
In addition to those top two sites, many frequented Baekbin railroad crossing in Yongsan-gu, the filming spot of dramas including “My Mister,” and “My First, First Love”.
For foreign residents with long-term visas, the most popular attractions included the old castle walls at Dasan-dong in Gyeonggi Province, Haebangchon in Yongsan-gu and barbecue joints in Gyeongui Line. The places were featured in “Nevertheless,” “When the Camellia Blooms,” “Beauty Inside,” and “Hospital Playlist: Wise Doctor Life.”
Popular places among short-stay visitors include Yeomri-dong salt road in Mapo-gu, Korea Broadcast Advertising Corp., a state-run advertising agency in Songpa-gu, and Light Pink Workshop in Gangnam-gu that offers jewelry-making classes.
“It seems foreign tourists are interested in experiencing Korea’s traditional culture, while those who live in Korea enjoy the recent wave of K-drama boom,” an LG Uplus official said.
Starting from 2021, LG Uplus tracks data on inbound and outbound tourism and the floating population to state-run agencies such as Korea Culture Information Service Agency, K-DATA and Korea Data Exchange.
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