Old Seoul Anbang in Miniature: Seoul Urban Life Museum Offers Family Hands-on Program

[Financial News] A hands-on program will allow families to create a miniature version of an old Seoul anbang furnished with a black-and-white TV and framed family mottoes. Participants will make and arrange household items featured in the museum’s exhibits while learning about housing and daily life in the past.
Seoul Urban Life Museum announced on the 1st that its "Family Life History Workshop—Making an Old Seoul Anbang in Miniature" will be held for 10 sessions every Saturday from the 10th through December 12. The program is open to families accompanied by elementary school children.
The program begins with an audiovisual lesson comparing homes today with housing spaces in the past. Participants then explore changes in period-specific anbangs, living rooms and household items in the "The Dreams of Seoul’s People" exhibition at the Life History Exhibition Room. Children and parents look for items they will make together, objects they still use today and things they have never seen before.
Even when household items are the same, parents and children may be familiar with them to different degrees. Choosing and recreating the exhibits together provides an opportunity to discuss not only the forms of the objects but also differences in the ways of life remembered by family members.
After viewing the exhibition, participants decorate a small anbang with wallpaper and floor covering, then make and arrange miniature items such as a black-and-white TV, a framed family motto, a calendar, magazines and corn. Local artist Kim Mi-ae, head of Mongamosil Workshop, will serve as the professional instructor.
Applications will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis for each family through the Seoul Metropolitan Government’s public service reservation website. Registration for each session will run from the Wednesday 10 days before the class to the Tuesday four days before it.
Applications for the first session, scheduled for the 10th, opened on the 30th of last month and will close on the 6th. Final participants will be notified through an announcement on the museum’s website and by individual contact three days before the class.
Choi Hyung-soo, director of Seoul Urban Life Museum, said, "I hope this will be a time when parents and children compare life in the past with life today, share stories with one another and experience the history of everyday life in an approachable way."
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