Hosting This Year's Garden Expo
Materializing the Jinju-Style Forest Garden Model
Jinju City in South Gyeongsang Province, which is striving to establish itself as a "Garden Culture City" and aiming for designation as a "National Garden," has been in the spotlight in the new year of 2026. In 2025, the city presented a new paradigm in garden policy by connecting gardens with urban environment, culture, and industry.
In particular, the "2025 Korea Garden Industry Expo" served as an interim achievement of Jinju City's step-by-step strategy to become a garden culture city. It has been evaluated as a meaningful turning point that confirmed both the establishment of a city brand centered on gardens and the institutional and cultural foundation for improving citizens' quality of life. As a result, there is growing interest in Jinju's unique garden policy.
▶ Garden Industry Expo, Laying the Foundation for a Garden Culture City
Following the "Wolasan Garden Expo" held twice in 2023 and 2024, Jinju City hosted the first-ever national-level garden industry expo in South Gyeongsang Province in 2025. This provided an opportunity to expand Jinju's garden policy onto the national stage.
The "2025 Korea Garden Industry Expo," held under the theme "Life with Gardens: Practical Gardens in Everyday Life," took place for 10 days in June 2025 at Chojon Park and the Jinju area within the Wolasan Forest. Approximately 410,000 visitors attended the event, drawing significant attention. The economic ripple effect of the expo was estimated at around 24.9 billion won, making a meaningful contribution to revitalizing the local economy.
Moreover, the expo was operated as an "expo for everyone," with participation from citizen gardeners, artists, businesses, institutions, and volunteers. The participatory gardens created by citizens, hands-on activities, and nighttime garden displays demonstrated the potential for gardens to become part of citizens' daily lives and shared experiences.
▶ Expanding Garden Culture through Citizen Gardener Training
The transformation into a "Garden Culture City" is permeating the daily lives of Jinju's citizens. The city's efforts to train citizen gardeners and discover private gardens have shifted the culture toward "gardening together," establishing garden culture as a driving force for spreading throughout urban life.
Jinju City has continuously trained citizens to participate in garden activities through a step-by-step "citizen gardener" education program. In 2025, 27 new citizen gardeners were trained, bringing the total to 128 citizen gardeners to date.
The "Private Garden Discovery Project" also supports this trend. This project, which identifies and shares outstanding private gardens cultivated by citizens, has become a model for spreading garden culture in everyday life and is being utilized as a new garden asset for the region. In 2025, eight new private gardens were selected, bringing the total number discovered to 44 so far.
▶ Expanding Garden Infrastructure with "Artist Gardens"
Jinju City is enhancing visitor accessibility and the stay environment by expanding amenities that meet the requirements of a "local garden," such as visitor shelters, welcome gardens, and waterside promenades. Additionally, three "artist gardens" are being created to enhance the identity and artistic value of Wolasan. These new artist gardens-Samdawon, Wolasumgol, and The Space Where Time Made Time Stop-feature artistic garden stories inspired by Wolasan's natural environment, terrain, and the passage of time.
With the creation of these artist gardens, Jinju City aims to further solidify the legal and institutional status of its gardens and strengthen their spatial foundation by registering as a "local garden" in 2026.
▶ "2026 Jinju Garden Expo" to Materialize Jinju-Style Forest Gardens
The "2026 Jinju Garden Expo" will be held in the Jinju area within the Wolasan Forest to commemorate the registration of Wolasan as a "local garden." This expo will focus on strengthening identity and will further materialize the "Jinju-style forest garden model" through space design that highlights Wolasan's characteristics and citizen-centered program operations.
Looking ahead, Jinju City plans to host the "Garden Art Expo" in 2027, centered around the Railroad Culture Park, which will integrate art, history, and urban garden content. The city aims to expand the garden policy and operational experience accumulated at Wolasan throughout the entire city.
A Jinju City official stated, "Jinju City has simultaneously pursued a multi-layered garden policy that creates spaces, nurtures people, and builds culture together. Based on these achievements, we will continue to promote various policies and projects to firmly establish Jinju as a garden culture city on the path toward becoming a national garden."
The small changes that began in gardens under the theme "Jewel in the Garden, Garden like Jinju" are now becoming part of the city's daily life. As gardens become a living culture in citizens' lives and function as an industry, Jinju City is designing a diverse future for the city through gardens.
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