K-drama sets draw fans to South Korea to see where shows that changed their lives are shot

South Korea’s tourism is booming, and much of it is down to devotees of Korean dramas and K-pop who want to visit sites associated with them

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People visit the set of K-drama series Mr. Sunshine at Sunshine Studio in Nonsan, South Korea. As the popularity of Korean dramas soars overseas, more tourists are planning trips around their favourite shows. Photo: AFP

Published: 7:15am, 25 Nov 2024Updated: 8:36am, 25 Nov 2024

In South Korea’s Chungcheong province lies a perfect replica of 1900s Seoul. Welcome to Sunshine Land, the latest K-drama theme park to cash in on K-culture tourism.

Fans of K-pop mega group BTS have long flocked to the country to see sites associated with the boy band, from the dorms where they slept as artist trainees to recent music video shoot locations.

But as the popularity of South Korean drama has soared overseas – it is the most viewed non-English content on Netflix, the platform’s data shows – more and more tourists are planning trips around their favourite shows, not music acts.

The idea that foreign tourists would pay good money and drive hundreds of kilometres out of the capital, Seoul, to see a K-drama set seemed “crazy” to tour guide Sophy Yoon – until she saw one of her guests break down in tears at Sunshine Land.

“At that moment, it hit me: for me, it was just a studio, but for them, it was something much more,” she said.

Preserved from the set of popular 2018 historical series Mr. Sunshine, the location in Nonsan, 170 kilometres (106 miles) from Seoul, is replete with painstaking replicas of everything from a turn-of-the-century tram to South Korea’s most famous Buddhist bell.