Day 6: The 1st Shop of Coffee Prince

Today was Saturday and there were a couple of events going on that I wanted to check out which determined my schedule for the day. The first was the Free Market in Hongdae that happens every Saturday and the other was a fireworks show along the Hangang River.

While I always had plans from the beginning to check out the Free Market, I was never all that serious about visiting The 1st Shop of Coffee Prince Cafe where they filmed the MBC Drama of the same name, though I always had thoughts to. I watched the drama during its run on MBC and found it very enjoyable and thought they used really great music throughout the drama. It had been several years however since it aired so my enthusiasm wasn’t the same now as it was then. I found a renewed vigor to visit the place however after researching and finding that it was located in the near vicinity of the Free Market which I was going to visit anyways. By reading various blogs and using Google and Daum Maps, I wrote down instructions on how to get to Coffee Prince and took those with me to Seoul. As I understand it, there are now several Coffee Prince Café locations around Seoul but the one in Hongdae is where they filmed the drama.

The night before, all my relatives were over so we ordered in a lot of food whose leftovers I had for brunch today. The Free Market didn’t open until after noon so I left home later than usual. To get to Coffee Prince, take Line 2 to Hongik University Station and leave by Exit 4. As soon as you exit the station, you will see a Seven Springs Restaurant. You want to head southwards down the street on the right of the restaurant until you get to a T-intersection. At the intersection, take a left going East and then take your first right going South (there should be a restaurant at that corner where you take the right). Continue South all the way down and the café is located virtually at the end of the street. The road towards the end starts to incline slowly. If you are interested in checking the place out, I plotted the route on Google Maps.

View 1st Shop of Coffee Prince in a larger map
The weather was again very warm and sunny and the walk down this street seemed longer than I thought that I started to doubt whether I had gone down the right street but then sure enough it was there, Coffee Prince!

If you’re standing from across the street, it doesn’t look like much and frankly a little messy and unkept covered in vines and greenery but it looks better once you’ve stepped off the street and on to the café property.

When I got to the café, it was around 1PM and it wasn’t too busy and the place had a couple of waitresses. The setup looked how I remembered in the drama with the counter, the round window and the wall with the flower paintings. Only the first floor of the café was accessible as the rest was restricted. The menus were written on boards behind and in front of the main counters.

My favourite flavour is strawberry so whenever given a selection of flavours that’s what I usually go for. I can’t remember exactly what it was called or how much it was but I think I ordered a Strawberry Mocha Latte and I think it was around 7,000-8,000WON. I had read that the prices at Coffee Prince were a bit on the expensive side.

I was so warm when I got to the café that as soon as I got my drink, I felt like I had sipped it down too quickly in a matter of moments. I don't think the idea of trying to drink a hot beverage to cool down works all that well. It was yummy though and gone way too fast that I was tempted to get another drink but I figured I’d just stick to the one drink. The part of the café where I was sitting had framed autographs all around the walls. I think I could make out Gong Yoo’s and Yoon Eun-Hye’s but I had no clue who the rest of the signatures belonged it. Once I finished my drink, I went back up to the counter to look at some of the souvenirs and ended up buying a mug.

Before my trip, I read many reviews of the cafe online where some said that the place was expensive and that there were so many better cafes in Seoul. While I would probably agree, in the end, those cafes simply aren’t Coffee Prince. If you are a fan of the drama or Korean dramas in general, I still recommend checking it out because as a a fan, it’s more than just about sitting down for a cup of coffee. Here are some video clips I took while I was there. Enjoy.^^