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Korea, surrounded by waters on three sides, features four distinct seasons and more mountains than plains. In these natural conditions, Korean people have developed unique and remarkable food, clothing, housing, and lifestyles. To survive a harsh winter and the intense heat of summer, they developed distinctive clothing made of diverse materials, and various healthy dishes made with the mindset that health comes directly from food. To adapt to the natural environment, they also developed a unique housing setup called hanok.
The Korean people learned to use various clothing materials, such as sambe (hemp), mosi (ramie), cotton, and silk, to make a range of clothing that was not only attractive but also provided them with effective protection even during the harshest winters and the hottest summers. They made warm winter clothes using the technique of wadding soft cotton between two pieces of cloth, silk, or cotton fabric, and stitching them in fine lines, and produced cool summer clothes with hemp and ramie. Hanbok is the traditional Korean attire made with these materials, typically featuring graceful lines and forms with a serene aura.
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Korea’s traditional clothing, hanbok, has maintained its basic traditional features throughout Korea’s 5, 000-year history while its styles and forms have evolved in various ways based on the lifestyle, social conditions, and aesthetic taste of the times.
History reveals that in general, Korean people in the past tended to prefer simple, white clothes to fancy ones. That is why they were often referred to as “the white-clad people” among their neighbors who admired them for being peaceful people. Nonetheless, Korea has also had a long tradition of enjoying colorful clothes with complex designs depending on the period and the wearer’s social status.
Today, South Korea is in the global spotlight because of a variety of hanbok designs that reinterpret traditional Korean designs and patterns in a modern artistic sensibility. The music videos of K-pop singers such as BTS and BLACKPINK also contribute to the higher global recognition of hanbok as an attractive costume for its unique style and beauty. In addition, its value is getting admitted popularly thanks to increasing attention even to the ornaments such as gat (Korean traditional hat) that appeared in the Korean drama, Kingdom, which was released for streaming on Netflix, the world’s largest over-the-top (OTT) platform.
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Korean people today seem to prefer clothes inspired by modern Western styles to their traditional clothes although some people still insist on wearing the latter on traditional holidays or special family occasions such as weddings. Their love of tradition and yearning for the new sometimes led to the creation of attractive “modernized hanbok.”
Gangnam-gu in Seoul, which is now a household name across the world thanks to “Gangnam Style, ” a K-pop song that shook the world in 2012, is a large district where wealthy residential areas sit alongside high-end art facilities and the busiest fashion streets. This special fashion zone attracts numerous fashionminded tourists from around the world with special fashion events by inviting global designers and holding contests for emerging talents to show their designs.
Another fashion district in Seoul that enjoys an international reputation is Dongdaemun-gu, now a hub of the regional fashion industry, which provides creative, affordable fashion items for the young at heart. With its fully developed distribution and sales networks, highly efficient production facilities, and a throng of talented, aspiring designers, this district is now a must-visit attraction in Seoul for foreign tourists.
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Since ancient times, the Korean people have believed that food and medicine share the same origin and hence perform the same function, following the adage that “food is the best medicine.” They believe that health and illness alike come from the food they consume and how they eat it, and this idea has played a crucial role in the development of traditional Korean medicine whose basic principle is that we should use medicine only after food has failed
One of the key words to understanding traditional Korean food is fermentation, a metabolic process that helps food to “mature” so that it can be stored for a longer period. The Korean foods that best represent the tradition of fermentation developed in Korea include doenjang (soybean paste), ganjang (soy sauce), gochujang (chili paste), and jeotgal (fermented fish sauce). The fermentation can take anywhere from several months to several years.
Two of the most important items of traditional fermented food in Korea are doenjang and ganjang. To make them, it is necessary to soak soybeans in water and boil them until fully cooked. Then, they must be pounded and formed into brick-shaped lumps, and left to dry and ferment. Then, they are placed in salted water in a large pot along with dried red chili and heated charcoal, which help remove impurities and odors during the fermentation process. The beans thus prepared are then left for about two to three months until they become fully fermented. This product should then be divided into two, solids and liquid, of which the former needs to be brewed for over five more months and the latter for over three months to develop a full flavor and taste. Just like wine, soy sauce tends to have a richer flavor and taste when brewed for a longer period.
Traditional Korean Clothing
Gochujang is a traditional Korean condiment made by fermenting a mixture of soybean malt, salt, and chili pepper powder with a blend of powdered rice, barley, flour, and malted barley. Gochujang has long been one of the most important traditional condiments among Korean people, whose palates have evolved toward a preference for hot and spicy foods since they were introduced to chili several hundred years ago. Chili and gochujang are now often regarded as a symbol of the vibrant, energetic disposition of Korean people
Doenjang Jjigae (Soybean Paste Stew) This stew-like Korean dish is made by boiling an assortment of ingredients such as meat, clams, vegetables, mushrooms, chili, tofu, and soy paste.
Jangdokdae (Soy Jar Terrace) An area outside the kitchen used to store large brown-glazed pottery jars containing soy paste, soy sauce, and chili paste. Korean pottery jars allow for proper ventilation, so they are perfect for preserving fermented food. The ideal location for Jangdokdae would be an area with sufficient sunlight and ventilation.
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Saeujeot (Salted Shrimp) One of the two most popular fish sauces in Korea, the other being anchovy sauce, this shrimp sauce made by fermenting salted shrimps is used to improve the taste of dishes, including kimchi.
Jeotgal is almost an indispensable kimchi seasoning and a very popular condiment used to enhance the taste of food. It is made by mixing one of a variety of seafood (such as anchovy, shrimp, oyster, or clam) with salt, or with other condiments in addition to salt, and fermenting it in a cool place. It is said that the longer it is fermented, the better it tastes. The tradition of making fermented fish sauce yielded several special delicacies including sikhae, which is made by fermenting fish mixed with rice and condiments.
Kimchi, which is gaining a worldwide reputation as one of the representative Korean dishes, has been praised for its anti-carcinogenic properties and nutritional value, as well as numerous variations that create excitingly diverse flavors and tastes. The most common type of kimchi is made by mixing salted white cabbage with kimchi paste made of chili powder, garlic, spring onion, Korean radish ginger, fish sauce, and other ingredients like fresh seafood. Kimchi can be eaten fresh but is normally consumed after fermentation for several days. Some prefer mugeunji, which is fully fermented for over one year.
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The ingredients of kimchi vary according to regions and special local produces and traditions. Seoul, for instance, is famous for gungjung kimchi (royal kimchi), bossam kimchi (wrapped kimchi), chonggak kimchi (whole radish kimchi), and kkakdugi (cubed radish kimchi), and Jeolla-do is well known for godeulppaegi kimchi (Korean daisy kimchi) and gat kimchi (leaf mustard kimchi).
Kimchi is getting well-known and well-received around the world. In 2001, the Codex Alimentarius Commission designated Korean kimchi as an international standard instead of Japanese kimuchi, and in 2012 officially published the term of cabbage made in Korea as “kimchi cabbage, ” which had previously been referred to as “Chinese cabbage” until then. In 2003, when severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) was spreading throughout the world, foreign media reported that the Korean people were safe from SARS because they eat kimchi, which triggered global attention to its efficacy. In 2006, Health Magazine, an American monthly, selected kimchi as one of the world’s five healthiest foods.
Bibimbap (literally “mixed rice”) is a Korean rice dish served after mixing it with an assortment of fresh and seasonal vegetables, fried egg, minced beef, and other ingredients. It is also served in a sizzling hot stone bowl, which is called dolsotbibimbap (Hot Stone Pot Bibimbap). The dish is closely related to Jeonju, a UNESCO-designated Creative City of Gastronomy, where food festivals such as the Bibimbap Festival are held every autumn, thereby attracting gastronomes from
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