The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps
Read my post “About Gangchon Rail Park” for information on how to get there and how to get the tickets. “Should we try out the rail bike?” I asked my husband, “It’s quite near Nami Island.” “Yes, it looks like an interesting and unique experience. …
“Where can I feed my nursing toddler?” That was the question pressing on my heart before our trip to Seoul. Jeju is easy because I can just latch her in the car we rented for our 4D3N trip. I searched online and found very little …
![Perfume Making in Seoul, Korea [Sponsored by Trazy]](https://travel.joogostyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/travel.joogostyle.com-Custom-Perfume-Making-in-Seoul-8A.jpg)
Eat Ginseng Chicken in Korea, yummy. Ride a rail bike, fun. Visit Nami Island, it’s beautiful. Make your own perfume in Seoul, that’s exotic. Well, at least it’s not common among tourists to Seoul. I was looking through Trazy.com for things to do in Korea, and this activity stood out. Months ago, a friend posted on Facebook about perfume-making in Singapore. I was intrigued, but it was not within my budget to sign for it. It’s easily double the price of what I saw on Trazy.
Btw, Trazy.com (“Trazy”) is a travel booking site where you can find tonnes of activities in South Korea (“Korea”) and Thailand — from day tours to concert tickets to manicure. Get inspired by what to do in Korea, especially uncommon tourist experiences like perfume making! :) Oh, and booking through the Trazy website will save you the hassle of overcoming the language barrier and making overseas calls. Almost all Korean establishments we encountered only have phone numbers listed for reservations.
The perfume studio conducting our perfume-making workshop is GN Perfume. They have a few branches, and we chose the Itaewon branch. However, it’s not easy walking from Itaewon Station, 1.2km. Trazy actually suggested walking from Noksapyeong Station (Line 6), which is 1km away. If you are coming from Itaewon, just take a cab. Why? Read on.
We were around Itaewon subway station to visit the Line Friends store, dine in a popular pancake shop called The Original Pancake House, and soak in the non-Asian vibes. And since we had some time before our 2:00 PM session, we decided to walk over to GN Perfume and enjoy the sights. Bad decision.
It didn’t seem bad initially. After climbing two to three slopes, the pin of the map indicated that we were near. However, a few more minutes later, I looked at the map again and something was amiss. I was trying to figure out if there’s something wrong with it. We had advanced this little after all this while?! The culprit slowing us down must be the never-ending steep slopes we had to climb, and I mean really steep slopes.
Our ample buffer time suddenly did not seem enough. We were going to be late. Hubby forged ahead with the stroller. I was already walking as fast as I could to catch up. I felt warm from the HeatTech inside. At the highest point, I saw an awesome view with what I assumed to be Seoul Tower nestled at the top of a hill.
I wanted to tell hubby to look at it, until I saw what he was looking at. A long flight of stairs! Gosh, that’s the only way down. The studio is right around the quiet corner at the bottom. Hence, my muscle man hubby carried the stroller with the baby inside and walked down that flight of stairs. In hindsight, I should have carried the baby. But we were too tired to think.
Imagine how tired and hot we were when we reached the warm studio. Because there was no air con nor cold wind entering the store, we felt warm for a long time after that.
The first thought I had was that it’s a hipster place with a feminine touch. Surprisingly, there was no overpowering scent wafting through the air. Nice cosy shop with bottles of perfumes and scents displayed neatly on the shelves. Other than the “ingredients” of the perfume, GN Perfume also showcases its own concoctions that are for sale.
And as we settled into our seats, the perfumer turned on calming music for us to get into the mood. There were only four seats available, and so I assumed the maximum number of workshop participants at any one time is four.
The perfumer guiding us through this perfume-making class is a friendly Korean lady named Eunji. She speaks limited English, but good enough to proceed with the class. I didn’t really quite catch her, but she’s either studying or has studied in an academy on scents.
Firstly, we were to smell seven types of perfume bases and choose one or two bases. It’s a blind test. We didn’t know what kind of bases we had chosen until she looked at our choices and described their characteristics. I picked ‘floral & musky’ and ‘young, fruity & sweet’. Hubby got ‘sporty, cool & aquatic’ and ‘woody’.
Then, through a questionnaire, we communicated to the perfumer the type of perfume we wanted to create. I wanted a light and fresh scent, while hubby wanted a cool and unisex type.
Based on our perfume bases and the desired type of perfume, she handpicked bottles of essence that are suitable for our bases. Hubby and I could share certain essences, but there were also a few others that were only suitable for our particular choice of perfume base.
We were to smell each essence she gave us and write down our impression, the type of emotions it invokes in us. For example, my first impression of cherry blossom essence is of flower and spring, while cassis fruits reminded me of sweet gummy bears.
After smelling, we picked 3 to 7 essences that we liked to add to the perfume base. We could add 35 drops of essence into the base, and we get to choose how we like to proportion these 35 and drip them into ourselves. For example, with 4 essences shortlisted, these were the number of drops I have assigned to each essence: 15 + 10 + 5 +5. Lily of the Valley got the most because I like the scent the best, and the name ‘Lily of the Valley’ is prophetically significant to me.
“I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys.” Song of Solomon 2:1
You should realise by now that we are smelling different scents quite a lot. Wouldn’t our sense of smell be confused after a while? Fret not! A jar of coffee beans is available for us to smell and “relax” our nose, something like cleansing our palate during wine tasting.
All in all, the whole process took about 50 minutes. This includes the time we were entertaining Baby E and running after her as she hustled around the small shop barefoot. p.s. The warm respite might be the reason for her to take off her own shoes.
There are a final few steps I have yet to mention. After we dripped the essences into the base, Eunji added more perfume base to top the bottle up to 50ml. Then she had us write on our own bottle labels – we get to name our own perfume!
She pasted the labels on the bottles and wrapped them in nice boxes! She had thoughtfully given us different wrappings to distinguish the two bottles. The blue box with white ribbons belonged to the man, my hubby, and the white box belonged to me.
Her final instructions for us were to let the perfume ferment for two weeks. This is for the perfume to emanate an even better-smelling scent.
It was really a fun experience to do it with hubby. He found it enjoyable too! Moreover, we could bring home this special gift we made for ourselves. With so many permutations to make a perfume, it’s really cool to customise and have our own one-of-a-kind perfume!
If I have convinced you to make your own perfume in Seoul, head over to Trazy and book your session: www.trazy.com/experience/detail/custom-made-perfume-in-seoul. Otherwise, if you prefer to do something to your hair, read about my digital perm experience at a hair salon in Seoul.
For more on my travels in Seoul and Jeju, be sure to bookmark my South Korea Itinerary.
GN Perfume (Itaewon Branch)
You might also want to check out my other posts on Korea. Leave your comments or questions below. Love to hear from you. :)
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Disclaimer: JoogoStyle and Christina accept no liability (whether in tort or contract or otherwise) for any loss or damage arising from any use, misuse, inaccuracy or omission of the information or other contents published on this website.
Disclosure: This activity was sponsored by Trazy, but opinions are of my own. Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. Affiliate link means I’ll get a small commission if you make a purchase. There’s NO extra cost to you. I appreciate your support to maintain this website, so that I can share more tips with you. Thank you!
![Hair Salon in Seoul for Foreigners: English Speaking [Sponsored by Trazy]](https://travel.joogostyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/travel.joogostyle.com-Hair-and-Joy-Seoul-Hair-Salon-2-760x400.jpg)
When overseas, I like visiting hair salons to try out the local trends. Did it in Hong Kong but ended up with an epic fail boy’s cut. Also did it in Taiwan and cringed at the frizzy limp perm, and on hindsight I think the …
Day Trip or 2D1N to Mount Seorak (Seoraksan) We were planning a day trip from Seoul to Mount Seorak (“Seoraksan”) until we found out about the travelling time. It is about 6 hours to and fro. Accounting for Baby E’s 7:00 PM bedtime, we will only …
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in October 2018 and has been updated in December 2018 for accuracy and comprehensiveness.
Running out of ideas what to do in Seoul? Hop on to a rail bike and ride on. There are two places near Seoul where you can experience this fun activity–Gapyeong and Gangchon Rail Park. Here’s a post mainly about Gangchon Rail Park.
Gapyeong Rail Park is nearer to Seoul and if you are going to Nami Island, it is more convenient with the City Tour Bus. You can book the bike tickets of Gapyeong Rail Park via Trazy .
Even though we are going to Nami Island before this, we decided on Gangchon Rail Park instead. Reasons being: ‘Running Man’ was filmed there (I’m an avid fan!), the scenery is better, four tunnels are being passed through instead of one, less distance to cycle as the last part is a scenic train ride, and lastly, there’s an option for VR experience!
Pedal the bike along discontinued railroad tracks and enjoy the Bukhangang River scenery. Pedalling makes the bike go faster, but you can only go as far as the bike is in front of you, unless of course you are the first one. If you are tired, rest your legs and allow your partners to do the hard work, or let the bike go slow on auto pilot. In any case, the bike is going on a slight down slope.
Begin your rail bike experience from Gimyujeong Station. Ride 6km to a pit stop and rest for 20 mins. Afterwards, enjoy the scenic train ride to the Old Gangchon Station (end point). You can take the free shuttle bus at the parking lot of Old Gangchon Station and return to Gimyujeong Station (the starting point).
It’s best to set aside 2 hours for this activity. The whole experience, including the train ride and shuttle bus transfer, takes about 1.5 hours. You might want to add another 30 minutes for buffer in your schedule.
Gangchon Rail Bike Park is a 5-minute walk from Gimyujeong subway station.
By train, there are two ways to travel from Seoul to Gangchon Bike Park (Gimyujeong station).
ITX is a high speed train that supposedly shortens the travelling time. Certain websites recommend not to take ITX because many passengers missed their train, waited 30 minutes for the next one and ended up late for this booked activity. According to them, not much time is saved with ITX anyway.
*Option 2 is similar to how we get from Seoul to Nami Island. So for ITX details, you can refer to Step 1 and 2 of the post, “From Seoul to Nami Island“. Advisable to book ITX tickets online in advance.
After alighting from the ferry at Gapyeong wharf, take the intra-city bus (green bus) or cab back to Gapyeong Station. And from Gapyeong Station, take a subway to Gimyujeong Station.
As I’ve mentioned, you can take the free shuttle bus at Old Gangchon Station, the end point. After you alighted from the train station, you need to walk to a parking lot. You can refer to the map below for reference.
From the train, walk towards a (car road) bridge and turn left unto it. At the bridge, there’s the map (photo below) to locate the shuttle bus stop. Follow the yellow arrows to the shuttle bus. The bus will bring you back to Gimyujeong Station, the entrance of the Rail Park.
We took the subway from Gimyujeong to Namchuncheon station for the ITX. We boarded the ITX and alighted at Wangsimni, where we took the subway (green line 2) to EWHA.
You can use these websites to help you plan your route: www.seoulmetro.co.kr/en/cyberStation.do; www.letskorail.com/ebizbf/EbizBfTicketSearch.do
You can leave straight from the end point and not take the free shuttle bus. In this case, you can either walk or take a taxi to Gangchon subway station. Walk 1.5 km for about 20 mins. Otherwise, take a 5-minute ride on taxi for ₩3,000 (S$3.70, US$2.70).
Because of the popularity and limited quantity of the two seater bikes, it’s better to book your Gangchon Rail Park tickets soon! Moreover, book early for your desired timing. There are specific timings you have to choose from.
Booking of Gangchon Rail Bike Tickets (2-Seater or 4-Seater):
Children under 36 months may sit on the lap of a paying adult for free. However, insurance doesn’t cover that child.
If you are also going to Nami Island, consider booking a fuss free tour package via Klook that includes both Gangchon Rail Bike and Nami Island. Have fun cycling!
Read about my experience and review in the post “Gangchon Rail Bike Review (Autumn)“.
Disclosure: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. Affiliate link means I’ll get a small commission if you make a purchase. There’s NO extra cost to you. I appreciate your support to maintain this website, so that I can share more tips with you. Thank you!
Travelling with a Toddler to South Korea (Seoul and Jeju) Be sure to bookmark this page as I update my itinerary of South Korea. It’s our second trip with E. She’s now a toddler! A different ball game when she was an 8-month-old infant during …
There are quite a few ways to get from Seoul to Nami Island, and I got a bit confused while searching for the perfect way. So after doing my research, I’ve come up with a step by step guide of how to get from Seoul …