Blue House’s Main Office Building to be opened from May 26

The lobby of the Blue House's Main Office Building [CULTURAL HERITAGE ADMINISTRATION]

The Cultural Heritage Administration said Tuesday that it will partially open the Blue House’s Main Office Building from May 26.

Visitors will be allowed to see the Mugunghwa and Inwang rooms on the first floor, the President’s Office and the reception room on the second floor, as well as the Chungmu room located in the annex building. The Mugunghwa room was used by First Lady as an office and to greet guests, while the Inwang room was used to hold luncheons and banquets. The Chungmu room in the annex building was used to gather large numbers of people to hand out appointment certificates.

From Monday, the Cultural Heritage Administration started managing parts of the Blue House opened to the public after the presidential office was moved to Yongsan District on May 10. On Monday, the administration partially opened the Yeongbingwan State Guest House and Chunchugwan Press Center.

Visitors are not yet allowed into the Official Residence, however, the Cultural Heritage Administration said all the windows of the residence will have their curtains opened from May 26 so that visitors can peek inside from the gardens.

The Main Office Building features the famous blue tile roof. It was established on Sept. 4, 1991 during the Roh Tae-woo administration. About 150,000 blue tiles, known as kiwa, were created for the roof — baked one by one over a long period of time to give them the strength to last more than 100 years.

BY YIM SEUNG-HYE [yim.seunghye@joongang.co.kr]