Shinsegae Department Store announced on the 13th that its dessert specialty hall, Sweet Park, located in its Gangnam branch, has celebrated its first anniversary.

To mark the first anniversary, a month-long dessert festival with the theme of 'Blooming Sweets' will be held, showcasing limited and new menus. Collaboration pop-up stores will also be held with the Michelin Guide 'Blue Ribbon' and convenience store CU.

Sweet Park, which opened on February 15th of last year, has attracted much attention as a dessert specialty hall that brings together bakery and dessert brands from around the world, from traditional Korean snacks such as Yakgwa and Gangjeong to traditional French baked goods, Belgian chocolate, Spanish churros, and cakes.   

Shinsegae Department Store tallied that Sweet Park has been visited by 12 million people in about a year. An official from Shinsegae Department Store explained, "It has established itself as the best 'dessert mecca' where you can enjoy the latest dessert trends in Korea," and added, "During the same period, dessert sales at the Gangnam branch more than doubled compared to the previous year, and the proportion of desserts in the overall food sales at the Gangnam branch also increased from about 15% to 30%."

To celebrate the first anniversary of Sweet Park, Shinsegae Department Store will hold a dessert festival for a month from the 15th to March 14th. The strategy is to attract customers with unique menus and pop-up stores during the peak dessert season, which includes anniversaries such as Valentine's Day and White Day.

First, 30 brands at Sweet Park will showcase limited menus, unique new menus for spring, and promotions.

For example, 'Beton', a restaurant famous for its salt bread, will introduce spinach basil salt bread using spinach and basil, 'Quelque Chose', a macaron brand, will introduce a 'Rose Macaron' 3-piece box with a rose scent, and 'Minute Papillon', a churros restaurant, will sell 'Churro Cheesecake' (a dessert containing a whole cheesecake in crispy churros) with various sauces for a limited time of one month.

Garigette will launch 'Garigette Mini Pie'. It is a set composed of various pastry desserts from Garigette in one box. 'Hanjeongseon', a restaurant famous for its fruit glutinous rice cakes, has released 'Shinsegae Glutinous Rice Cake', a snow scene glutinous rice cake using white bean paste, as a limited menu for Sweet Park.

In addition, brands such as 'Buchang Confectionery', 'Le Pain', 'Maman Gateau', 'Mannadang', 'Browter', 'Biscuiterie MO', 'Slice Fox', 'Seasonique', 'Auchi', 'Index Caramel', 'Jean Boulangerie', 'Koun Koun', 'Taegeukdang', 'Kitchen 205', 'Pierre Marcolini', 'Happy Happy Cake', 'Knotted', 'Surugi', and 'Scope' are scheduled to sell limited and new menus.

Benefits are also prepared for each store. 'Shawto' offers 4 types of Dakuaz and gift wrapping for free to customers who purchase a strawberry No. 2 cake on the 17th-19th on a first-come, first-served basis. At 'Chifflet', if you visit wearing pink clothes for a month, you will receive a souffle cheesecake for free.

Special pop-up stores will also be held during the festival.

First, from February 15th to 24th, 'Blue Ribbon Bread Week' will be held, where you can meet bakeries that have won the Blue Ribbon at the '2024 Le Pain Baguette & Croissant Championship' as pop-up stores. The Le Pain Baguette & Croissant Championship, which started in 2018, is a competition to select the best baguette and croissant artisans in Korea, and is considered the most authoritative bread competition in Korea.   

This pop-up will feature Flower Artisan Bakery (Gangnam, Seoul), which won the grand prize in the baguette category, Ma Ye (Seocho, Seoul) in 2nd place, Bakery Mui (Yongsan, Seoul) in 3rd place, Haewoldang (Ulsan) in 1st place in the croissant category, Boulangerie Chuncheon (Chuncheon, Gangwon) in 2nd place, Le Pain (Songpa, Seoul) in 3rd place, and Antique (Seocho, Seoul). You can taste not only the award-winning works such as baguettes and croissants, but also the representative menus of each bakery.

From February 25th to March 7th, local bread restaurants will be invited and introduced. For example, there will be an encore pop-up of 'Seulji Bakery', a famous steamed bun restaurant in Buan, Jeonbuk Province, which caused a daily open run when Sweet Park opened. Sweet Park has been introducing bread houses from all over the country, which are usually difficult to visit, as pop-up stores, inspired by the 'bread pilgrimage' culture of traveling to distant areas in search of delicious bread.

From March 8th to White Day on the 14th, a pop-up store will be opened in collaboration with CU convenience store. It will introduce a variety of differentiated desserts that reinterpret CU's bakery series. During the same period, a domestic distribution industry-exclusive pop-up of 'Candy Apple', a specialty store for 'Ringo Ame (apple candy)' in Hokkaido, Japan, will be held to commemorate the first anniversary of Sweet Park and the White Day season.

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