SK set to open restored historic gate in Seoul
Source: Agencies |
April 30, 2013, Tuesday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
FIVE years after being torched by a disgruntled elderly man, the stone and wood southern gate to the old walled capital of Seoul has been painstakingly restored to its late 14th Century glory by master craftsmen using traditional tools.
From the hand-carved stones of the walls flanking Sungnyemun gate, to the finely wrought details painted on the inner beams of the graceful, upwardly curving roof, each detail of what's considered the country's top treasure is meant to harken back to the day the gate was completed in 1398. On the ceiling beneath the center archway there are two large, whiskered and horned dragons, rendered in vibrant yellow, green, blue, pink and orange scales.
Ahead of its public opening on Saturday, reporters yesterday got an advance tour of the gate, where royal officials of the Joseon Dynasty unveiled policies, offered prayers for rain and hung the heads of executed criminals.
The two-story pavilion stands in vivid contrast to the surrounding glass-and-steel skyscrapers and the bustling, traffic-choked streets that radiate from the gate into a city that has seemed to be in a perpetual building frenzy since emerging from the rubble of the 1950-53 Korean War.
The craftsmen wearing traditional Korean clothing labored to restore the gate, trimmed timber with axes and chisels, hammered massive stones into shape, fired handmade roof tiles in kilns before affixing them to the roof using traditional tools. They worked in as much of the surviving original timber as possible.
The gate, also known as Namdaemun, was destroyed in February 2008 by a man angry over a land dispute with the government.
From the hand-carved stones of the walls flanking Sungnyemun gate, to the finely wrought details painted on the inner beams of the graceful, upwardly curving roof, each detail of what's considered the country's top treasure is meant to harken back to the day the gate was completed in 1398. On the ceiling beneath the center archway there are two large, whiskered and horned dragons, rendered in vibrant yellow, green, blue, pink and orange scales.
Ahead of its public opening on Saturday, reporters yesterday got an advance tour of the gate, where royal officials of the Joseon Dynasty unveiled policies, offered prayers for rain and hung the heads of executed criminals.
The two-story pavilion stands in vivid contrast to the surrounding glass-and-steel skyscrapers and the bustling, traffic-choked streets that radiate from the gate into a city that has seemed to be in a perpetual building frenzy since emerging from the rubble of the 1950-53 Korean War.
The craftsmen wearing traditional Korean clothing labored to restore the gate, trimmed timber with axes and chisels, hammered massive stones into shape, fired handmade roof tiles in kilns before affixing them to the roof using traditional tools. They worked in as much of the surviving original timber as possible.
The gate, also known as Namdaemun, was destroyed in February 2008 by a man angry over a land dispute with the government.
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