Culture ministry names Hangang-ro-dong project top public design winner

The culture ministry said that a resident-led safety-design project in Hangang-ro-dong won the top award in the 2026 Korea Public Design Awards.

The prize went to Yongsan-gu Office's Living Lab "Yongyong Lab" project, which tackled noise, illegal dumping and parking shortages where homes and commercial districts intermingle. It used illuminated markers with crime-reporting QR codes to address repeated intrusions into homes mistaken for businesses, and public-order reminder lights for noise in shopping areas. Residents, district officials and police jointly operated the lab to identify problems and test locally tailored responses. The ministry said the project was highly rated for establishing an operating model that lets participants act autonomously beyond individual complaints and facility upgrades.

The ministry selected 14 project-category winners and three research-category winners. Other project winners included an accessible subway-signage initiative at 10 major transfer stations in Seoul and an inclusive playground in Paju for children with and without disabilities. In the research category, Park Jae-eun received the culture minister's award for a study proposing that Seoul's more than 4,500 public artworks and sculptures be treated as urban-planning assets rather than decoration. Joo Hana received the Korea Craft and Design Foundation president's award for research on a museum social-prescription operating system. A Victor Margolin special award went to a study of an augmented-reality speech-bubble system for visualizing nonverbal emotional information during group conversations for people with hearing impairments.

"This year's selections show that the people shaping public design are not limited to government or experts, and that everyone can become a public-design designer," Choi Hwi-young, the culture minister, said. "We will support the spread of these efforts to other regions and settings."

The awards ceremony will be held on Oct. 23 as the opening event of Public Design Festival 2026. Project-category winners will be exhibited in a Culture Station Seoul 284 exhibition opening Sept. 16, while research-category winners will present their results at an Oct. 24 joint academic conference at Culture Station Seoul 284 RTO.