Baedari Secondhand Bookstore Alley information

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Baedari Secondhand Bookstore Alley (Korean: 인천배다리헌책방거리) is a historical and cultural space in Dongu-gu, Incheon, South Korea. The Baedari Alley was once home to about fifty bookstores specializing in secondhand books, but only a handful remain today.^[1] The name Baedari comes from the name of the village Baedari meaning where boats and ships dock, and it currently covers the Geumchang-dong and Songhyeon-dong of Dong-gu, Incheon. This place was a gateway to import culture from Jemulpo port (the old name of Incheon) since it was open to foreign trade. After liberation, those who lost their homes around the port came to Baedari for food, to find a job, and to live. It is an area where various modern experiments were made as the modern culture brought in from the West and the traditional culture of the Joseon Dynasty formed a cultural interface. The film school, the cradle of modern education for Koreans, the Incheon Public Ordinary School, and the private school Uiseong Sasuk nurtured Korean talent in Baedari. It is an area with significance in the history of modern Christianity in Korea. Presently, Baedari is full of old bookstores, stationery stores, photo studios, restaurants, murals, craft shops, photo galleries, Baedari Space Beam.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7][8]}

Baedari alley used to be on the outskirts of the city's development. There used to be a bridge over the sea for ships, but now there is a bridge leading to a neighboring village under the Incheon line railroad. Even with the development plans in Incheon, this alley doesn't host high-rise buildings but rather densely populated single-family houses. Around ten stores carry on the history of Baedari Secondhand Bookstore Alley. These stores are running for over 40 years since the early 1960s. Most of the books are being sold at half the price of their regular price. These bookstores handle all kinds of books from ancient Korean literature materials to art, music, oriental medicine, professional books, technical books, children's collections, language books, textbooks, reference books, and dictionaries.^[9] One feature to stand out in these secondhand bookstores is that books are arranged in stacks, piled without classification.

At the entrance of the alley, there is Baedari Mural Street, which depicts the old faces and lives of the people of Baedari on the walls of the old alley. These murals were painted one by one on the walls of the alleys in Daldongne Village and Baedari Secondhand Bookstore Street in the 60s and 70s to preserve the aesthetics of Baedari.^[7][10] Wall paintings depicting forebears’ harsh life story and their daily ordeals are found in the area around Changyoung Elementary school which is about 100 years old. The Baedari Village has transformed from a space to buy and sell old books into a new cultural space for the villagers. Moreover, the locality became a tourist attraction and sort out place for K-drama lovers after some scenes of the popular shows were shot there.^{[11][5][7][8][12][13][14][15][16][1][17][18][10][19][20][21][22]}