We were in Seoul for about three weeks; I was there with two other friends and we were mainly excited to skate around all the insane spots, but also got to sightsee and hang out with some really fun people! The food and beer was incredible and our local friends would take us around to amazing fried chicken spots and just the most extravagant shopping areas and skate spots you could imagine. Besides the usual touristy stuff I had an interesting time getting some tattoos as they are illegal in Korea, but thanks to our friends we found some amazing parlours and got a couple from a great Japanese artist.

What’s the skate scene like?

The skate scene in Korea was interesting. Being relatively young, with the first shops opening in the 1990s, it had this tight knit feel to it and an excitement that attracts a diverse group of people. The main aspect that stood out to me was this sense of peaceful rebellion the skaters had, it was really going against the status quo for them to be doing what they do and as passionately as they do it.

Many spots?

The skate spots in Seoul are amazing; everything was marble, perfect to skate and best of all there are no skate stoppers. Some of the spots we saw seemed like they were straight out of a video game. The spots seemed to be never ending, it is just such a huge city you could never find everything. Skate spots we would session for hours and hours back home we would just skate past without bothering, because without a doubt there would be something ten times better around the corner.

Is there a central meeting spot for skaters?

The local skaters had worked really hard in getting a small plaza area called Culture Park open for skateboarding. There was a Southbank feel to the plaza and you could tell this was the Mecca for Korean skateboarding, with portable ramps, rails and ledges all set up amongst the existing stairs, ledges and hubba. Getting busy around 2 o’clock everyday, this place was the meet up!

What were the best/worst things about your trip?

Best thing about this trip was just getting to meet all these new and inspirational people and get a real eye opener into a different world – the differences culturally were really intriguing to me. Just getting to have the chance to chill out and skate whenever and however I wanted was the best experience. The worst would probably be just the usual injuries; rolling my ankle quite early on, which put me off my board for a week and also meant I couldn’t do some of my normal go to tricks.