Suwon Hwaseong Fortress

UNESCO World Heritage Site: Hwaseong Fortress (1997) · Suwon, Gyeonggi

Hwaseong is the great walled fortress that surrounds the old centre of Suwon, about an hour south of Seoul. It was built from 1794 to 1796 by King Jeongjo, who moved the tomb of his father, Crown Prince Sado, to Suwon and planned a new city around it, partly in filial devotion and partly as a new power base. Its design, overseen with the scholar Jeong Yak-yong, combined Korean, Chinese and Western ideas and used new machinery such as cranes and pulleys to lift the stone. The wall runs about 5.7 kilometres over the hill of Paldalsan and across the town, with four great gates, including Paldalmun and Janganmun, watchtowers, bastions, beacon towers and the Hwahongmun floodgate over the stream. Badly damaged in the Korean War, it was rebuilt from the detailed record of its construction published in 1801, the Hwaseong Seongyeok Uigwe. At its heart, the Haenggung palace holds martial arts displays, while visitors walk the walls, shoot traditional bows, ride a small tour train and end with Suwon galbi. UNESCO listed it in 1997.

320-2 Jeongjo-ro, Paldal-gu, Suwon, Gyeonggi, 16255, South Korea

NO OPENING TIME HERE WAS CHECKED. The typical pattern: the fortress wall can be walked around the clock, with ticketed sections staffed roughly 9 am to 6 pm; the Haenggung opens roughly 9 am to 6 pm, with last entry about an hour before closing, and has extended evening openings in some seasons. Martial arts displays run at set times on set days, mostly in the warmer months. Archery and the Eocha train stop by late afternoon. The traps that ruin a day are missing the display times, climbing Paldalsan at the end in the heat, and sending a taxi to Hwaseong city instead of the fortress. Confirm current times before relying on them.

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