Dongdaemun Market is a wholesale market in Seoul, Korea. At Dongdaemun, you can find everything from clothes and shoes to toys to fish tanks and live birds. This market opened in 1905. It was completely destroyed during the Korean War, but it was slowly rebuilt over time. In 1998 and 1999, large shopping malls like Migliore and Doosan Tower were built. Some parts of the market like the Doota shopping mall Hyundai City Outlet have a more modern feel but other parts like the shoe and toy market have a traditional market feel.
Dongdaemun Market can be hard to navigate, so I wanted to provide a video walking tour of some of my favorite places in Dongdaemun Market.
The subway stop is Dongdaemun Station.
Fabric and Accessories Market
If you go out of exit 8, You’ll see the JW Marriott hotel and next to it, a building which houses my favorite place in Dongdaemun. On the first four floors of the building, you will find the fabric market. Most of the sellers are wholesale sellers, but if you want to buy fabric for your own personal projects, you can buy it by the meter, and prices are negotiable. If you want to buy fabric by the meter, look for vendors that have the bolts of fabric there in the stall. A lot of vendors just carry samples and have to call to place an order from their warehouse.
On the 5th floor, you’ll find the beads and accessories market. This is pretty much heaven for anyone who likes to make jewelry or hair accessories. I like to go here and just browse at all the bits and bobs. I will usually pick up something for my girls to make a hair clip. I like that a lot of the prices on the bowls are marked. On the lower floors of the same building & outside, they sell trims and pompoms and zippers and things that you use to make clothes.
Shoes Market
If you go out of exit 8 and walk through this little underground shopping area, make a left before the glass doors at the end of the walkway. Then when you see the number 3 above, make a right out the glass doors. You should be coming out of Exit 1 of the underground shopping mall. You’ll see DAISO, and the entrance to the wholesale shoes market. This shoe market is out of control. They carry men’s, women’s and children’s shoes. A lot of them are designer knock offs. Korea used to be big on manufacturing before it transitioned into a service based economy, and it used to be the place that manufactured shoes. The shoe vendors are tough negotiators and I think mostly they are here for their wholesale business. I’ve bought shoes here for my kids. I would say check the prices on g-market or even amazon to see what the retail price is, then expect the wholesale price to be less than that.
Toy and Stationery Market
If you turn left once you emerge from the shoe market, and then keep walking down the street, passing a church, you can head towards the toy and stationery market. Walk for about 5-7 minutes until you reach a fish shop on your left and a big street. Walk one block until you see the Rubiks cube sign, and you have reached the wholesale toy and stationery market. This place is nuts. You can buy all sorts of things here. There are a tons of craft items for kids, bags of squishies, slime, beads, and more. The store with the big bear in front I believe sells real toys and not knock offs. (There are actually knock offs of Disney toys on this street). In this area you’ll also find a few wholesale stationery stores.
Wholesale Clothing Market
From the shoe market entrance, if you cross the street and go towards DDP, you can head over to the fashion town. This is where you’ll find the night market which is a wholesale market that opens late at night for all the clothing shops in Korea. These places sell wholesale but some shops will still sell to individuals.
In this market I saw a few designer knockoffs, like Bottega Veneta and Stella McCartney copies, but because they didn’t carry the trademarks of the bags they are not actually illegal. A lot of the items were just plain leather bags though.
Hyundai City Outlet
Hyundai city outlet is a large department store. What I like about this place is the 8th floor which is the kids area. There’s a Lilliput kids cafe here which is probably one of my favorite kids cafes, but it’s kind of pricey. The kids clothes in this area are cute but really expensive, but it’s fun to look. Downstairs in the basement I believe there’s a banana milk cafe if you’re a fan of banana milk! And there’s a food court which is a nice place to get something to eat.(
Doota
Doota is a big shopping mall. The best thing about Doota is that shake shack is here. This is my go to place to eat in Dongdarmun. Here you can find all kinds of things. On the basement floor they have men’s wear and sportswear brands and a Remicone location where you can get this thunderbolt ice cream. Then on the upper floors they have women’s clothing, and kids clothing and there’s a Tayo the little bus kids play area. Oh and if you can’t get a seat at shake shack downstairs, take the elevator up to the 4th floor and you can find extra seat of as well as bathrooms.
Migliore
Migliore is another large department store in a really tall building but when you walk through this store, it feels like you’re in a local market. It’s a little bit ghetto for lack of a better word, but I’m pretty sure that the prices are cheaper than they are at Doota. I”ll just take you for a short walk through here so you can see what I mean.
Am Pm
AM PM is a store that has a similar feel to Migliore, kind of an informal local market feel. Kind of like you are in a clothing warehouse.
Lotte Fitin
Lotte is one of those big chaebol in Korea – the large family owned corporations. When you see a name like Lotte, or Hyundai, or Samsung, you can be pretty sure that it will be nice. It’s at the far end of the row of tall buildings. The unique thing about LotteFitin is the game center for older kids and adults -they have a batting cage and a place where you can play curling virtually.