For the crafty among you

Some of my loyal readers have asked about shopping, and how I acquire craft supplies (like yarn, fabric, etc). Craft stores as we know them don't exist here, but I do have the BusanJin ShiChang - the Busan Jin open market! Its a wonderland and can be completely overwhelming.

Here's the button area:


There's another row of buttons across the aisle, and a couple on the next aisle over, and again on the next...
This is the nice lady who cuts fabric for me. She's the one that likes me. Her partner doesn't because once I asked for one yard ("han ma") and she cut me three ("se ma") instead.


Some of the booths are like platforms surrounded by bolts. This old lady sits on her platform all day looking down on the shoppers as they go by. Its usually quite crowded, so she gets to see a lot of elbow action in the aisles.

This is a craft supply booth, selling things like sequins, feathers, and beads. If you want something, you just have to elbow your way up to the counter and start talking to the shopkeeper. If you are polite and wait till they stop talking, or if you wait till someone leaves to move forward to the counter, you'll be there all day.

In addition to all the booths selling supplies, there are also many many booths that will make clothing for you. This woman and about 200 of her neighboring booth owners specialize in sewing "hanbok," the traditional dress that you don't see much on the streets but are still very popular for special occasions and holidays.

I didn't get a shot of the zipper lady, the yardstick lady, the bias tape man, the ribbon booth, the snap man, etc etc. Each booth is specialized. What I haven't found is the interfacing booth or the thread booth! American country-style quilting is quite popular here and there are several booths that sell all kinds of quilting supplies. Here you can purchase American import printed cottons, for just a little more than in the US: About 16,000 won per yard, which is about $17.50. Korean fabrics, by contrast (cottons or poly) are about $5.00 a yard. Silks and fancier fabrics are anywhere from $16-50 and up.

What you can't tell from these few photos is that the market is quite large. I used to think it was huge until I went to a similar market in Seoul. I don't know how many individual booths are at the Jin market, but at the Dongdemoon market in Seoul there are over 4,000 booths. The Jin market has three floors, so it probably has less than 1,000 booths. Unfortunately, it takes more than 30 monutes to get there from my house, otherwise I'd prabably spend lot more time there!