Daejeon Yuseong Hotel Preserved as Record... VIP Room 313 Also Documented

Promotion of Documentation Including Photo and Video Shooting, Drafting Work, Lodging Ledger, and Room Number Plates

Daejeon Yuseong Hotel, which ceased operations at the end of last month / Daejeon - Photo by Park Jongmyung

Daejeon City announced that it will promote a documentation project for Yuseong Hotel, which ceased operations last March and is scheduled for demolition this year.

The documentation project includes photography, video recording, drafting work, as well as the collection of various records showing the management and operation of Yuseong Hotel, such as lodging registers and room number plates. It also involves oral interviews with the staff who protected Yuseong Hotel until the very end and its guests.

In particular, an investigation and documentation will be conducted on VIP Room 313, which was not open to the public. This room, specially created in the 1970s, was unlike other rooms and was not accessible to the general public. It was a place where prominent political figures in modern Korean history, such as Kim Jong-pil, Kim Young-sam, and Kim Dae-jung, stayed. The interior still retains luxurious antique furniture and chandeliers, and its preservation condition is good.

The documentation project is not limited to Yuseong Hotel but will also cover records related to Yuseong Oncheon as symbolized by Yuseong Hotel and Hotel Rivera (formerly Mannyeonjang). It aims to record the role Yuseong Oncheon played in the development of Daejeon as a modern city.

Yuseong Hotel blueprints and other materials / Daejeon City

Yuseong Hotel, which first opened in 1915, was loved as a honeymoon destination in the 1960s and 70s and maintained the reputation of Daejeon Yuseong Oncheon, but it closed its business on the 31st of last month.

No Gi-su, Director of the Culture and Tourism Bureau of Daejeon City, said, “Yuseong Oncheon, along with Bomunsan, has long been a beloved urban recreational space for Daejeon citizens,” adding, “The results of this year’s documentation project will be used to create a special exhibition room within the old Chungnam Provincial Government building during the ‘Daejeon 0 o’clock Festival’ period, and we will devise concrete plans to utilize it as cultural content.”