Seoul’s beauty-adjacent districts get talked about as if they were variations on one template — a main road, some towers, a lot of signage. They are not. Cheongdam and Apgujeong are organised around wide arterial roads and the upper floors of large buildings. Hongdae and Yeonnam are organised around a university, ground left behind by railways that no longer run, and a residential street plan never designed to hold shopfronts. That is a difference in how the ground is shaped.
This piece is about the district itself: how the streets got their shape, which entrances put you where, and what kind of beauty-related businesses sit here rather than elsewhere.
A note on the name first. Hongdae is a contraction of Hongik University’s Korean name — the first syllable of Hongik joined to the first syllable of the word for university. It is not an administrative name and appears on no address. The legal neighbourhood names underneath it are Seogyo-dong, Donggyo-dong, Sangsu-dong and Hapjeong-dong, all in Mapo-gu in western Seoul, with Yeonnam-dong immediately north. Dong means an administrative neighbourhood unit. So “in Hongdae” names an area, not a street.
The district is named after a university, and it shows
Hongik University sits in the southern part of the area, and the district grew outward from the campus rather than along a single road — the structural difference from a district laid out on one arterial, where addresses and density both organise themselves along it. How commercial density actually varies street by street here we do not know: we found no published measurement of it, and are not going to describe a pattern we have not measured.
Yeonnam-dong to the north has a separate origin. It became its own dong in 1975, when part of Yeonhui-dong in neighbouring Seodaemun-gu was split off into Mapo-gu. Yeonnam means “south of Yeonhui” — a plain description of where the new dong sat. It was residential first and commercial later, and the housing stock is still standing: businesses here occupy converted low-rise houses on their original footprints, which is why entrances are often one door wide. We have no count of how many, and are not implying one.
Korean press reporting states that a Hongdae culture and arts tourism special zone was designated in December 2021, covering roughly 1.13 square kilometres across Donggyo-dong, Seogyo-dong, Hapjeong-dong and Sangsu-dong. We could not confirm that on a government page — treat it as reported, not verified.
Three streets here follow railways that no longer run
This explains the district’s odd geometry. Three streets sit on ground that used to carry rails — which is three streets, not three railways. The park follows one corridor; the two shorter stretches come off branch alignments in the same network.
The longest is the Gyeongui Line Forest Park. Seoul’s official tourism site describes it as 6.3 km, running from the Gajwa Station end in the north, down through Hyochang Park Station in Yongsan-gu, to the Wonhyo 1-dong community service centre. It exists because the Yongsan–Gajwa railway section was moved underground and the surface right-of-way became a park, completed in 2016. Some stretches keep recreated rails and crossings as display pieces. One correction worth carrying: Gajwa Station is not in Mapo-gu. Its registered address is 27 Susaek-ro, Nam-gajwa-dong, in Seodaemun-gu — so the park’s northern end is at a borough boundary, not inside Yeonnam.
The Yeonnam-dong stretch is the longest single section, and is widely nicknamed after Central Park with the first syllable of Yeonnam standing in; you will see it written 연트럴파크. Korean tourism listings put it at roughly 1.3 km. The shape matters more than the length: a former rail corridor is long, narrow and near-straight, with grass and benches but very little width. It works as a spine, not a square, and there is no centre to cluster around — the frontage runs along both sides of a line. Here, “which side of the park” is often more useful than “which street.”
The second is the walking street on Eoulmadang-ro, on the university side. It carries a second, given name: 걷고 싶은 거리, “the street you want to walk.” Mapo-gu’s official tourism page places it at Seogyo-dong 348-40, reached from Hongik University Station exits 8 and 9 heading toward the university, and notes that its gentle curve follows the old Danginri Line — a freight branch off the Yongsan Line that ran from Seogang to the Danginri power station and closed in 1980. The curve is why the main pedestrian street here bends, and why a district that feels like it should have a grid does not.
The third is short: a roughly 200-metre path at Wausan-ro 32-gil 5, running along an old rail alignment from Hongdae toward Sinchon, with a level crossing recreated on it. Its local name is 땡땡거리, after the sound a crossing bell makes. Sources do not agree on which line ran here — Seoul’s tourism site describes it as a Gyeongui Line crossing, other Korean accounts assign the stretch to the Danginri branch — so we are leaving that open.
One station name, three separate railways
Hongik University Station is served by Seoul Subway Line 2, the Gyeongui–Jungang Line and the Airport Railroad. Those are run by different bodies and their platforms sit apart under a single station name, so a transfer here means walking between separate platform areas rather than stepping across. We saw a distance quoted on a user-edited Korean wiki but found no official figure, so we are not stating a number.
One detail worth knowing before you land: the Korea Tourism Organization’s English guidance states that the Airport Railroad’s Express Train runs non-stop from Incheon International Airport to Seoul Station, and that Hongik University Station is served by the All-Stop Train. The express does not stop here.
The district also has southern doors. Hapjeong Station is where Line 2 and Line 6 meet; Line 6 opened in full in 2000, which is when it became an interchange. Sangsu Station is on Line 6. Both put you on the lower, riverward edge, not at the university.
| Entrance | Lines | What you land in |
|---|---|---|
| Hongik University Station, exit 3 | Line 2, Gyeongui–Jungang, Airport Railroad | Gyeongui Line Forest Park, 447 m per Seoul’s tourism site — the Yeonnam side |
| Hongik University Station, exits 8 and 9 | same station | Eoulmadang-ro walking street, per Mapo-gu — toward the university |
| Hapjeong Station | Line 2, Line 6 | Southwestern edge, away from the busking street |
| Sangsu Station | Line 6 | Southern edge, campus side, closer to the river |
Exit numbers do a lot of work here. The wrong one can put you on the far side of a station complex containing three railways.
The ground is not flat, and the grid is not a grid
Hongik University’s Seoul campus sits against Wausan, a hill on the southern side of the district, with a back gate connected to it. We could not find an official elevation for Wausan and are not going to guess one, but the consequence does not need a number: the university side has slope in it, and streets that look equivalent on a map are not equivalent underfoot.
North of the station, Yeonnam’s street pattern is a different problem. It was laid out as housing, so the alleys are short, they change direction, and they were sized for a car to reach a gate rather than for a shopping crowd. Addresses here carry a gil, which means a smaller street branching off a larger named road — Sungmisan-ro 29-gil branches off Sungmisan-ro. The numbering is systematic, but on alleys this short the numbers run out quickly and pick up again around a corner, so a number that looks close on a map can sit around a bend.
What kind of businesses sit here
The beauty-related formats most often associated with this district in Korean-language listings are non-medical ones: hair salons, nail studios, make-up and profile photography, personal colour consultation studios, and self-service photo studios — 셀프 사진관, a room rented for a short slot where you work the shutter yourself with a remote and no photographer present. We have no verified count of any of them; that list is what the listings show, not a measured distribution. What these formats share is structural rather than clinical: short sessions, booked in blocks rather than by referral, often on upper floors of small mixed-use buildings.
On how this district relates to Seoul’s medical aesthetic districts, we want to be precise about what we did and did not do. The Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service publishes a table of clinic counts by district and declared specialty, open to anyone — no login, no request. We have not put a figure from it into this piece, and the reason is not access. Its smallest reporting unit is the borough: Mapo-gu as a whole, which sweeps in Mangwon, Gongdeok, Seongsan and everywhere else inside it. Hongdae and Yeonnam are neighbourhoods within that borough, so a Mapo-gu total would not describe either, and we are not going to present it as though it did.
The formats listed above are not clinics. That is not the same as saying they sit outside every rule, and we are not going to classify any specific business or service for you — categories overlap, and where a particular service falls is a question for the operator and the relevant authority. Whether a given concern belongs with one category or the other is a clinical question, and that belongs with a licensed medical professional.
The vertical problem
Businesses here are often on the upper floors of small low-rise buildings rather than at street level. The building carries a stacked column of signs outside, one line per tenant with a floor number, and the entrance is often a narrow stair or small lift set back from whatever shop occupies the ground floor.
That changes what an address does for you. A street address and building number get you to the door but not the floor, and where the ground floor is an unrelated business, the number alone does not confirm you have arrived. Yeonnam adds a second version: converted houses keep the original gate and yard, so the place you want may sit behind a wall showing nothing but a house number and a small plate. The floor is not part of the address — it has to come from the business.
The district runs on a different clock
We did not observe this district hour by hour, and found no published footfall data for it. What follows is what the district’s own listings describe. Mapo-gu says the Eoulmadang-ro street is noisy every night with buskers who come from all over the country — the district office’s wording about its own district, not our characterisation of the volume. The linear park in the north is a different kind of space, a through-route with grass and benches along a former rail corridor, and the two are roughly a subway stop apart.
One thing holds regardless of the hour: a street busy at two in the morning tells you nothing about whether an appointment-based business is open, because those schedules are unrelated. Salons, studios and consultation rooms keep their own posted hours, and we found no published district-wide figure for what those hours typically are — the listings we looked at varied, and a handful of listings is not a survey. Check the specific place.
Mapo-gu lists an art market at Hongik Children’s Park, Wausan-ro 21-gil 19-3, in front of the university’s main gate, held on Saturdays. We did not confirm its current season, so check before planning around it.
Weather matters here because of the shape. The linear park is open ground with tree cover but no roof, and the Yeonnam alleys have no continuous covered walking of the kind an underground shopping level or a long arcade provides. There is no sheltered version of the same route — the distance between the subway exit and the door is the distance you are exposed for.
What this district is not
Next to districts we have written about before, the difference is what the streets were built for. Cheongdam and Apgujeong grew along wide roads. Gangnam Station is an interchange with commercial density stacked around it. Dosan-daero is a named arterial organising the addresses along it. Hongdae and Yeonnam grew around a campus, over ground that closed railways left behind, and through a residential street plan that predates the commerce now sitting in it. If part of your day is here and part is south of the river, the walk inside Hongik University Station is part of the journey.
Questions that come up about this district
Are Hongdae and Yeonnam-dong the same place?
They are adjacent and blur at the boundary, but they are not the same. Hongdae is informal shorthand for the area around Hongik University, covering parts of Seogyo-dong, Donggyo-dong, Sangsu-dong and Hapjeong-dong. Yeonnam-dong is a separate legal dong to the north, created in 1975.
Which exit should I use at Hongik University Station?
It depends which half of the district you want. Seoul’s official tourism site gives exit 3 for the Gyeongui Line Forest Park, 447 m away, which is the Yeonnam direction. Mapo-gu gives exits 8 and 9 for the Eoulmadang-ro walking street toward the university. We found no official description of every numbered exit here, so for anything else confirm against the address you hold.
Does the airport express train stop at Hongdae?
According to the Korea Tourism Organization’s English guidance, no. The Airport Railroad Express Train runs non-stop from Incheon International Airport to Seoul Station, and Hongik University Station is served by the All-Stop Train.
Are Seoul’s medical aesthetic clinics in this district?
We are not giving a number, and the reason is not that we could not get one. The Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service publishes clinic counts by district and declared specialty, openly and without a login. But its smallest reporting unit is the borough — Mapo-gu — and Hongdae and Yeonnam are neighbourhoods inside it. A borough figure would not answer a question asked about two neighbourhoods, so we have not used one, and have not substituted a ratio or a range for it.
How long does it take to cross the district on foot?
We have no verified end-to-end walking time, because the district has no agreed boundary to measure between. The distances we could confirm are short: 447 m from one station exit to the park, roughly 1.3 km for the Yeonnam park section, about 200 m for the rail path toward Sinchon. Those numbers miss slope on the university side and the stop-start pace of narrow alleys.
Method — The park’s length and route and the 447 m exit 3 distance come from Seoul Metropolitan Government’s official tourism site; Gajwa Station’s borough comes from the station’s road-name address rather than that listing. The Eoulmadang-ro location and exits, the old Danginri Line alignment, the rail-path address toward Sinchon and the art market address come from Mapo-gu’s official tourism pages; the market’s Saturday schedule and its location at Hongik Children’s Park come from Korean-language listings of the same market, and we did not confirm its current season. The Airport Railroad express versus all-stop distinction comes from the Korea Tourism Organization’s English airport transport guidance. The Yeonnam-dong 1975 boundary change and name origin, the 1.3 km park figure, and the Danginri Line’s route and 1980 closure come from Korean-language tourism and reference sources; those sources disagree on which line the crossing path at Wausan-ro 32-gil sat on, and we have left that open. The 2021 special zone designation and its 1.13 km² area come from Korean press reporting and could not be confirmed on a government page. The Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service’s clinic table is publicly accessible without a login; we did not take a figure from it because its smallest reporting unit is the borough. We found no official transfer distance inside Hongik University Station and no official elevation for Wausan; both are stated as unverified rather than estimated. No business is named here, we have visited none, and nothing here rests on our own observation.
Seoul Beauty Brief is not a medical provider and its writers are not doctors. Nothing here is medical advice, a diagnosis, or a recommendation of any provider, treatment or business. We describe places and how they are laid out; we do not assess anyone’s suitability for anything. Whether a given procedure or service is appropriate for you is a question for a licensed medical professional who can examine you, and we cannot make that judgement on your behalf. Transport, addresses and opening arrangements change without notice — confirm anything time-sensitive with the operator before you travel.
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