Visiting the National Folk Museum of Korea: Korean Life From Birth to Death
Living in Korea for many years means that many parts of Korean culture gradually become familiar. You see traditional holidays celebrated every year, hear about customs from your children, eat seasonal foods, and come across traditions in everyday life. But seeing these things separately is different from seeing them brought together as one story.
That was what I found particularly interesting when our family visited the National Folk Museum of Korea (국립민속박물관) in Seoul.
The museum is not simply a collection of old objects. Its exhibitions show how ordinary people lived, how their lives changed with the seasons, and how important stages of life were marked—from the birth of a child and growing up to marriage, family life, old age and death.
For me, this way of presenting Korean culture made the visit much more meaningful.
A Museum About Everyday Korean Life
As we moved through the museum, there was a great deal to see. I did not photograph everything because there were so many exhibits worth stopping to look at carefully.
Some displays focused on the yearly rhythm of life. We saw objects connected with farming, seasonal customs, clothing, food preparation and household work.
One display showed tools and ingredients connected with kimjang, the tradition of preparing kimchi for winter, as well as meju, fermented soybean blocks traditionally used to make foods such as doenjang and soy sauce.
Looking at these objects together makes it easier to understand that food traditions were closely connected with the seasons, family work and preparation for the months ahead.
Korean Life From Birth to Death
The part that interested me most was the exhibition about the stages of human life.
The museum presents major life events and customs such as birth, education, adulthood, marriage and family life, work, aging, funeral rites and ancestral memorial rites.
I liked this approach because instead of looking at history only through kings, wars or major political events, we could look at the lives of ordinary people.
People were born, children grew up, families worried about their health, young people became adults and married, people worked, became old and eventually died. Customs surrounding these stages changed over time, but many of the feelings behind them—hope for a healthy child, concern for family and respect for previous generations—are still easy to understand today.
Birth Traditions That Reminded Me of Uzbekistan
One of the exhibits showed geumjul (금줄), a traditional straw rope associated with childbirth.
Traditionally, after a child was born, a straw rope was hung at the entrance of the home. It announced the birth and also signaled that visitors should stay away during the sensitive period after childbirth.
This immediately made me think about Uzbekistan.
We also have a tradition connected with protecting a newborn during the earliest period of life. Traditionally, outsiders do not see a newborn for the first 40 days. Practices can differ between families today, but the idea was familiar to me: a newborn and mother need a protected period before the baby is introduced more widely to other people.
The Korean and Uzbek customs are not the same, but seeing the geumjul reminded me how cultures that developed far apart can sometimes have surprisingly similar concerns around childbirth and protecting a new baby.
These are the kinds of comparisons I find especially interesting after living between two cultures.
The Baby Clothes and Mozart Record
Another display that caught my attention contained tiny baby clothes alongside objects connected with childhood and parenting. Among them was a Mozart record.
It was an unexpected combination and one that made me stop for a closer look.
A museum can easily make us think of history as something distant, but small objects like children's clothes, books, music and things used at home make the past feel much closer. They are connected with experiences that families still understand today—having a baby, caring for a child and thinking about how children grow up.
This was one of the displays I particularly remembered after our visit.
Food, Work and Family Life
Other sections showed objects that once formed part of everyday Korean life: traditional clothing, household utensils, farming equipment, games and objects used for preparing and storing food.
Seen individually, some of these objects can look quite simple. But together they show how much work went into running a household and preparing for different seasons.
There were also displays connected with family celebrations and ceremonies. Traditional clothing, food and ceremonial objects helped show how important moments in life were shared not only by an individual but by the wider family.
That family-centered aspect was another part of the museum that felt familiar to me as someone from Uzbekistan, even though the specific Korean and Uzbek traditions are different.
From Traditional Korea to More Recent Memories
What I especially liked was that the museum did not stop with very old traditions.
As we continued, the objects became increasingly familiar: radios, records, books, household goods and other things from more recent decades.
This created a visible transition from a largely traditional way of life toward modern Korea.
For children growing up in today's Seoul, some of these objects probably already look ancient. For adults, however, displays from the more recent past can bring back memories of childhood or stories told by parents and grandparents.
That mixture of old traditions and relatively recent everyday history makes the museum interesting for different generations.
Walking Through the 70s and 80s Streets of Memories
One of the most enjoyable parts for our family was outside the main exhibition halls.
We walked through the “70s and 80s, Streets of Memories” (7080 추억의 거리) area, where shops and other spaces recreate the atmosphere of an earlier period in Korea.
There was an old electronics shop with televisions, radios and appliances displayed behind the window. Instead of simply seeing these objects inside museum cases, walking along a recreated street made it easier to imagine how a Korean neighborhood might once have looked.
For someone who knows today's highly modern Seoul, this part of the museum creates an interesting contrast.
An Old Arcade Game for a Modern Child
The outdoor area also gave our children something they could experience rather than only observe.
My child found an old-school arcade machine and stopped to play it.
I liked this moment because an object from an earlier generation suddenly became interesting to a child growing up with completely different technology.
The controls, screen and machine looked very different from today's games, but the desire to stand there and play was probably not very different from what children felt decades ago.
Experiences like this can make a museum visit easier for children. They do not have to understand every historical explanation to find something that catches their attention.
More Than I Could Photograph
Looking back through my photos, I realized that they show only part of what we saw.
There were many displays that I did not photograph. At some points it was more interesting simply to look, read and move through the exhibition with my family than to try to document everything.
Perhaps that is also why the museum stayed in my memory.
It presents Korean culture through things that once belonged to ordinary life—clothes, food, tools, toys, household objects, family customs and ceremonies. Together, they tell a much larger story about how people lived.
Practical Information for Visiting
The National Folk Museum of Korea is located at 37 Samcheong-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul, next to the Gyeongbokgung Palace area.
Admission to the museum's exhibitions is currently free. Admission to Gyeongbokgung Palace itself is separate.
Current museum opening hours are generally 9:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m. from March through October and 9:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. from November through February. Opening arrangements and holiday schedules can change, so it is a good idea to check the museum's official website before visiting.
For current opening hours and visitor information, see the official National Folk Museum of Korea website.
Is the National Folk Museum of Korea Worth Visiting With Children?
For our family, the museum was much more than a place to look at historical objects.
What interested me most was seeing the course of Korean life presented as a whole—from birth and childhood to adulthood, family life, aging and death. At the same time, the exhibits about food, seasons, work and more recent decades showed how everyday Korean life itself has changed.
For our children, there were also things that made history more tangible, including the recreated streets and old arcade game.
For me, some exhibits created another layer of interest because they made me think about Uzbekistan. The geumjul tradition surrounding a newborn was one example. The customs are different, but the underlying concern for family, children and important stages of life felt surprisingly familiar.
After years of living in Korea, I already knew many individual parts of Korean culture. What the National Folk Museum of Korea did differently was put many of those pieces together.
Sometimes understanding a culture does not begin with its biggest historical events. It begins with seeing how people were born, how they raised their children, what they ate, how they worked, what they celebrated and how they remembered those who came before them.
