Gamcheon Culture Village awarded as a “Region·Tradition Culture Brand”
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Gamcheon Culture Village in Saha-gu, nicknamed “Busan’s Santorini”, has won a 2012 Region·Tradition Culture Brand Excellence award by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.
The awards aim to discover and support an outstanding regional culture brand and were held for the first time this year. The grand prize went to Sarangbang Culture Club in Seongnam City, in Gyeonggi-do. The award comes with financial support of 20 million won for the village.
Gamcheon Culture Village was formed by Korean War refugees back in 1950. The village's location on the hillside long made it a temporary place of abode for the poorest of the poor, who aspired to move on to better accommodation as soon as possible. But the village is now an attractive feature of the old city with its terraced houses on the hill, and maze-like narrow alleyways. To preserve this local cultural treasure and historic resources, local residents, artists, members of the academia and local government came together and started a project to develop it into a sustainable cultural village.
Finally, the poor hillside village was transformed into a beautiful village of culture and became a new tourist attraction for both Korean and overseas visitors, with its own distinctive culture and unique views.
Various projects to turn it into a cultural village have been carried out with the active involvement of local residents. A café and community center were opened as part of the Hillside Road Renaissance project in 2011. Construction of a small museum and gallery are also currently under way.
As a result of all these efforts, Gamcheon Culture Village has become an established "Culture Brand” visited by about 70,000 tourists per year. A UNESCO international work camp was held at Gamcheon Culture Village two years in a row and senior officials from Uganda and Tanzania visited here recently to benchmark the regeneration of the village.
