You might not expect to walk through a narrow, gray alley for a coffee break in Seoul where you can easily find cafes everywhere. Cafes and restaurants that crash-landed in this area are characterized by the lack of signboards. Some places don’t even have their signs to infer a place from, while some places have small flyers posted like signboards. You usually have to climb high and steep stairs to the third to fifth floors if you want to go to cafes or restaurants.
The gray staircase leads up to the cozy cafe where you might get not only a tasteful cup of coffee but also instagrammable photos. Euljiro is a place where a new word “newtro” is perfectly matched. Newtro is a combination of the words new and retro, retrospect, referring to a new interpretation of retro culture. Old manufacturers toil inside the ecosystem of 10,000 hardware stores, furniture shops and more — while young entrepreneurs decorate their stores with multicolored lights and plants. Two totally different aspects of the city coexist in Euljiro. Walking into a dilapidated building to discover an upscale bar, artists’ spaces and restaurants seem to be quite attractive to Korean youngsters.
Business owners who settled in Euljiro rely greatly on social media, especially Instagram to attract visitors. Every cafe and bar, it seems, has a signature drink or some distinct feature that can’t be found elsewhere to make customers actually drop by to take pictures for their SNS
This warm and cozy cafe turns into a wine bar at night.
Don’t forget to bring your fully-charged mobile phone when you visit Euljiro. It might help you to find a way to hidden places where you need to check street names and numbers constantly. Moreover, you might get the best shot of the Korean trip.
