If there were one place in Seoul I wanted to visit with Fafa, it would be Ssamziegil. Ssamziegil is a cultural shopping complex located in the middle of Insadong.
Though I had been to Ssamziegil before ━ almost a decade ago with Yin, I could remember a few things about it. I remember the spiral walking path and the rooftop where Ddong Cafe (the poop cafe) and, more importantly, the reason I wanted to return with Fafa, the Love Wall were located.
Imagine Paris Love Lock Bridge, but instead of locks, the Love Wall in Ssamziegil was covered with cute pink tags written by lovers. Back then, Yin and I made a pact to come back to Ssamziegil with our partners to write and hang our love tag there.
So that day, I brought Fafa to Ssamziegil, without telling the real reason I wanted us to go there, as he would tease me all day about it.
70 Stalls of Ssamziegil
We reached the four-floor building and slowly made our way, floor by floor, passing all the stalls selling cute stuff. Under different circumstances, I’d want to stop at each one of them. This time though, I just wanted to get to the rooftop so we could write our love tag, which I planned to take a picture of so I could post on IG and tag Yin with it. Saying that there were a few stores that we ended up stopping at.
The first was a cool-looking clothes stall owned by a Korean who makes and sells her designs ━ from t-shirts to tote bags. Fafa wanted to get a sweatshirt from here, but too bad they didn’t have the right size, so we got me a sticker instead and continued our way up.
Then there was the corner stall that offered face customisation on cards, canvas to plaques. The only caveat is that you must wait for a week for the customisation to be completed. So if you are like me, who is into everything customised, plan your Seoul trip accordingly so you can visit Ssamziegil at least twice.
Fafa also got me super cute Totoro earrings for the second-floor store, which I had worn throughout the rest our trip. We also made one last stop at a small place near the stairs that sold beautiful Korean charms, but I chickened out when I couldn’t see any price tag on the items.
There was also a DIY fortune-telling corner, a photo booth and other cute stalls depending on what you are into.
No More Wall of Love
Eventually, we reached the rooftop. To my dismay, I couldn’t find the Ssamziegil Wall of Love. I looked everywhere. All the love tags were gone. I tried to google what happened to them, but I couldn’t find any news about it, at least not on the first five pages of Google.
I wonder whether it got something to do with Covid? or did something else happen?
Soon after, we left Ssamziegil.
Would I ever come back? — I know it’s silly to say, but Ssamziegil lost the charm on me without the Love Wall, so maybe not.
Ssamziegil address: 44 Insadong-gil, Jongno-gu, Seoul, South Korea.
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Ai kalli, didn’t tell me about all this love wall 😊
No point, it was no longer there…