Cultural Heritage Foundation Supports Traditional Weddings and First Birthday Parties for Socially Disadvantaged Groups

Second Recruitment Until the 12th of Next Month

The Cultural Heritage Administration and the Korea Cultural Heritage Foundation will support traditional weddings and first birthday parties for socially disadvantaged groups from the 15th of next month until November 4th. The events will be held at Han-guk-ui Jip in Jung-gu, Seoul, and will provide banquet services, photography, and video recording free of charge.

Han-guk-ui Jip is a building constructed in 1957 as a guesthouse. It introduces traditional food and lifestyle culture along with beautiful landscaping. Because of this, it is often used as a venue for traditional weddings and first birthday parties.

The Cultural Heritage Foundation supports traditional weddings for sixty couples including basic livelihood security recipients, lower-income groups, multicultural families, national veterans, Saeteomin (North Korean defectors), and people with disabilities. Additionally, it supports first birthday parties for thirty single-parent families and teenage single-parent families (unmarried mothers and fathers).

This year’s first traditional wedding couple is Park Hyosim and Lee Ilduk. They are Saeteomin who became a married couple in 2019. Although they have formed a harmonious family with three children, they were unable to hold a wedding ceremony due to financial difficulties and only registered their marriage. They said, "In difficult circumstances, a wedding felt like a luxury," and "We want to show our children the meaning of family and the proud image of parents through a traditional wedding."

The Cultural Heritage Foundation selected thirty-three couples for traditional weddings and thirteen families for first birthday parties in the first recruitment. The second recruitment will be held on the website until the 12th of next month. An official stated, "This event was planned to realize welfare through national heritage," and added, "We will create various opportunities so that more citizens can enjoy and appreciate the value of national heritage."