The last shoemakers of Seongsu
(WorldNews South Korea)

A worker makes leather shoes at one of Seongsu`s 300 shoemaking factory workshops, Monday. This factory supplies its shoes to Kolon, a brand better known for outdoor apparel. / Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk By Lee Suh-yoon Seongsu, an old factory town in Seongdong-gu, eastern Seoul, is no longer the affordable safe haven for the working class of Seoul. Its shoemakers — their numbers now down to 2,500 from 6,000 five years ago by industry estimates — are the first to feel the pinch. `All these fancy cafes and bars down the street, they don`t really help us,` says Choi Kyung-jin, a shoemaker who has worked here since 1979. `The rising rent is slowly pushing out factories...