Seonjam: A Sensory Space Bridging Place and Time

Nestled in Seongbuk-dong, where fortress walls trace mountain slopes, lies Seonjam. Near the site stands the historic Seonjam Complex, where the Joseon Dynasty held the Seonjam Ceremony—a state ritual as significant as the ancestral rites at Jongmyo Shrine and Sajik Altar—to pray for prosperous sericulture. Though some twenty mulberry trees still grow here, the site bears the scars of colonial history. During the late Korean Empire, Japanese influence led to the ceremony’s reduction and the loss of a 400-year-old mulberry tree. The ceremony honored ‘Seoreungssi,’ who first taught humans sericulture, with queens of Joseon personally demonstrating silk cultivation to promote the practice. Like Seoreungssi’s ancient teachings of sericulture and weaving to protect people from cold and pursue beauty, this ceremony exemplified the dynasty’s benevolent governance.

Café Seonjam emerged from a desire to reimagine these fading cultural traces for contemporary times. The space immediately immerses visitors in the ceremony’s narrative: silk-wrapped handles offer a refined, tactile greeting, while a vermillion thread gate—inspired by traditional Korean hongsalmun gates—serves as a spiritual guardian and a reminder of Joseon’s ceremonial heritage.

The space engages all senses through silkworm moth-inspired sofas, lighting fixtures based on traditional looms, a cocoon-shaped room with ambient silkworm sounds, and beverages made from the mulberry leaves that silkworms consume. This multisensory approach transforms forgotten cultural elements into visceral experiences, creating a distinctly Korean narrative from 1477 to the present, eschewing Western or Japanese influences.

Seonjam prioritizes ‘experiential design,’ orchestrating elements that stimulate all five senses. Silk threads dancing in the breeze, the tranquil silkworm chamber bathed in soft light, and verdant plants evoking mulberry forests converge naturally, transcending everyday perception to bridge past and present. Thus, Café Seonjam transcends its role as a mere beverage establishment to become a cultural stage where visitors can fully immerse themselves in Seongbuk-dong’s temporal and emotional landscape.

Ultimately, Seonjam roots itself in history while remaining open to present and future possibilities. It reinterprets sericulture’s legacy of welfare, aesthetic sensitivity, and reverence for nature, demonstrating sustainable human-nature interactions. This space transforms Seongbuk-dong’s historical context and artistic spirit into tangible experiences and aims to reinvent ancient memories as contemporary culture. As visitors encounter the gentle presence of silkworms, the fragrance of mulberry trees, and the timeless beauty of silk, they naturally absorb Seongbuk-dong’s profound narrative. This subtle resonance embodies Seonjam’s value of synesthetic experience and its vision of a sustainable future connecting locality, nature, and humanity.