“Two years for gathering energy of the earth with the sounds of water, wind and human footstep, and six years for looking after ginseng. Six-year-old Red Ginseng nourished by the devotion of KGC (Korea Ginseng Corporation) for eight years. ”Opened on the first floor of KT&G (Korea Tobacco & Ginseng Corporation) Tower last August, Café Sapoon Sapoon expresses the advertising copy of Cheong-Kwan-Jang implicatively.

Sapoon Sapoon is a compound word of Saponin, main ingredient of red ginseng, and Spoon, a tool to deliver taste and nutriment of food. As Sapoon also means ‘a figure of light and careful step’ and ‘light and refreshing state of body and mind’ in pure Korean word, people can feel refreshing scenery with light beverage.

Sapoon Sapoon is a casual space created by KGC in order to be free from the perception, ‘Red ginseng is nothing but health functional food’, while keeping credibility of company and its quality-first spirit. Betwin Space Design grafted traditional ideology of Cheong-Kwan-Jang on this café modernly. They applied two elements, ‘Nature’ and ‘Lab’ to the space for delivering the products produced obstinately for a long time to young customers intimately.

They obtained the motif from the scenery of ginseng field. All the natural elements composing the field such as wooden structure for screening sunlight, shading curtain, wind, and hilly spot become design elements of Sapoon Sapoon. Sculpture on the ceiling which overwhelms the space secretly symbolizes the wooden structure to control the quantity of sunlight. Fabric which surrounds the repetitive sculptures is a metaphor of shading curtain, which penetrates the light while fluttering naturally in the wind.

And they created various shapes of seats, reflecting customers’ extensive needs for seat. It also applied the element of ‘earth’ through the design method to put wood on concrete or to compose diverse levels. Outdoor terrace has chairs and backs formed only by level difference, which is extended to inside organically. Along table in the middle expresses the feeling of earth only with the matter property of concrete, and plants are placed on it here and there.

Lower part of front bar patternizes the figure of spreading ginseng roots in three dimensions, a sculpture behind the bar displays professionalism and credibility with piping equipment for Cold Brew and materials reminding of laboratory.

Design: Jung-gon Kim, Hwan-woo Oh – Betwin Space Design
Photography: Yong-joon Choi