How to get photographed at Seoul Fashion Week

Can’t get into the shows at Seoul Fashion Week? No worries, as the Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP) grounds outside the venue function as a giant runway of sorts themselves. (As one of our reporters stated, the twice-yearly festivities are like a Comic-Con for Korean fashion.) Here are a few cardinal rules to getting yourself noticed by the street photographers:

Don’t wear all black. Unless you want to remain hidden among the sea of paparazzi, fashionistas, curious tourists and models going into and out of shows, which only seems to grow larger as the day gets later.

A sea of black at the Dongdaemun Design Plaza during the Spring 2017 Seoul Fashion Week collections. (photo by Yuan-Kwan Chan / Meniscus Magazine)

Be a Song Jae Rim or Park Bo Gum look-alike. Seriously, it doesn’t hurt.

If you have a cute child (or are a cute child yourself), make sure that he or she has a modeling contract. Why? It turns out that the wide-eyed adorable tots wearing layers of designer clothes and bling were actually baby and child models planted there by their agencies. So there is some pretty stiff competition.

An extra weapon in amping up the cuteness factor when it comes to kid street shots: feed them sugar. (photo by Yuan-Kwan Chan / Meniscus Magazine)

When all else fails, find a gimmick. Perhaps this is in the form of an accompanying dressed-up pet. Or, in the case of an empty closet, a cat mask.

This dedicated cat mask wearer hung out at the DDP day and night more than once throughout Seoul Fashion Week, seemingly for the sole purpose of taking selfies with fans. (photo by Yuan-Kwan Chan / Meniscus Magazine)

Treat the DDP as your personal runway. Better yet, show off your well-practiced catwalk in unison with friends after having carefully coordinated outfits in advance. If you don’t succeed the first time, as they say, try, try again, because maybe a photographer will notice you the second time around. (Need a tutorial? Watch “Fashion King” – the film version starring Joo Won, Sulli and Ahn Jae-hyun – which was partially shot at the DDP and features many a spontaneous runway walk-off, in a way parodying the circus that happens twice a year at Seoul Fashion Week.)

Extra points if you pose for the photographers WHILE strutting down the runway – er, around the DDP. (photo by Yuan-Kwan Chan / Meniscus Magazine)

If you can’t beat them, join them. The celebrities and models in the selfie – or selca in Korean – game, that is. The show venues are smack in the middle of the fashionista chaos, so the VIPs often have to trek through the area to get from Point A to B, and they often stop to take photos with fans. Quite a few Korean models, especially the men, don’t have long runway careers because they often use the shows as a stepping stone to drama and variety show stardom. Several such examples from the men’s side alone include Song, Ahn, Kim Woo Bin and Kang Dong Won.

Model Park Hyeong Seop after the CHARM’S Spring 2017 show. In addition to Seoul, Park has walked the runways in the fashion show “Big Four”: New York, London, Milan and Paris. (photo by Yuan-Kwan Chan / Meniscus Magazine)

If you can’t join them…become a celebrity?