Korea’s first Western-style restaurant shuts down

Its location is expected to be renovated to make way for a haute restaurant complex.

Seoul Station Grill, a restaurant in Seoul believed to be the first to serve Western-style cuisine in Korea, has announced it will shut down due to pandemic disruptions after nearly a century of business, Yonhap reported.

The restaurant, which opened on 15 October 1925, on the second floor of the old Seoul Station building, is known for introducing pork cutlet and hamburger steak to Koreans for the first time during Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910-45.

An employee said the entire fourth floor of the station is expected to be renovated to open a new haute restaurant complex. A fine dining steak restaurant is purported to be scheduled to take over Seoul Station Grill's place.

Seoul Station Grill was acquired by the state-run Korean National Railroad after Korea's liberation from Japan. The management rights were handed to Plaza Hotel in 1983, and the restaurant was later relocated to the fourth floor of the new Seoul Station building.