I know, that’s a lot of pictures of coffee shops. But where else can I sit in the warmth for long amounts of time to draw? And as you can see, I’m not the only Starbucks addict of Korea!
Seoul under my hand – Starbucks addict!
Seoul under my hand – Graphism
I enjoy the beautiful use of typographic fonts and simple shapes I found all around me.
MMMG is a café/stationary shop and stands for Millimeter/Milligram.
Seoul under my hand – stone pot bibimbap
I wandered North of Anguk one night and found a district full of gorgeous tiny little cafés and restaurants. Beautiful setting, stone pot bibimbab and little heaters, what more could I need!?
Seoul under my hand – From the top
For complicated reasons I crashed a 400€ gala in Seoul’s Grand Hyatt. It is located at the very top of Namsan, Seoul’s central mountain. Here is the view I sketched from the bar, while I was trying to look like I belonged.
Seoul under my hand – #9
The brand new line 9 of the metro has little flowers engraved on its metal doors…
Seoul under my hand – Slow food
As a vegan, I landed in Korea full of apprehensions. It’s a very, very meaty country. The national dish is barbecued beef slabs. Memorizing the phrase “without meat please” didn’t prevent me from having to pick animal pieces from my food on a regular basis, because small chunks apparently don’t count!
But I quickly found some surprising and great options. One of them is Korean porridge – which this chain made its central dish. It’s rice and water based, instead of wheat and milk, and complemented with plenty of veggies, nuts or meats. Rice and pumpkin porridge is apparently a winter staple. Here, I ordered a pine nut porridge bowl, which came along with tiny plates of cabbage, nori, red pepper sauce and pickled veggies.
Seoul under my hand – Over the top Christmas
Speaking of which, these two are in a Paris Baguette – the one near the French Embassy in Gangnam. See the huge bows everywhere and the cheesy white Christmas tree? It’s like this everywhere.
Seoul under my hand – Tea and pastries
Jasmine tea and coffee and cake shop in my subway station. It’s part of a chain called Paris Croissant, which of course I find hilarious. The sister chain that does bread is Paris Baguette.
Koreans love twinkles. Even in a subway station the shop windows are full of twinkly lights. Very Christmassy!
Seoul under my hand – Starbucks is a giant library
I’ve already been booed on Facebook for the small number of pics I took. But luckily for you I compensated by more drawing. I’ll post them until New Years’.
The Starbucks of Seoul are like giant libraries. This one, near Insadong, was full of students with their books, papers, laptops, highlighter pens and study groups.