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Little Forest (리틀 포레스트, 2018) is Yim Soon-rye’s quiet film about Hye-won (Kim Tae-ri), who leaves city life for her childhood home in the countryside and cooks her way through four seasons with ingredients from the fields around her. Ryu Jun-yeol plays Jae-ha and Jin Ki-joo plays Eun-sook, her childhood friends. Unlike the city-set hits that dominate filming-location lists, almost everything here was shot in one Gunwi county — one village, one house, one station — which makes it a rare single-county film trip.
Miseong-ri: the house
Hye-won’s House is the guide’s anchor and its only confirmed stop. VisitKorea’s location page names it as the home of the film’s main character, and says the site quickly became Gunwi’s main attraction, with the film’s bicycle still there to ride. The Gunwi travel article adds the detail that matters for planning: most filming took place at this isolated house and the surrounding fields, the house stands empty, and entry is free of the usual museum rules — no ticket, no opening hours. The county itself still treats the house as a living asset: on 22 October 2026 Gunwi-gun’s local food research group held a tasting of dishes from the film in the house’s yard.
What you see is deliberately un-dressed. The kitchen where Hye-won cooks, the wooden porch, the yard with its farm tools and the persimmon trees are all as filmed, and the house sits at the edge of a village of only about twenty households. That is also the visit’s main rule: the village is home, not a set, and the guide’s access notes ask for quiet paths and no wandering into private yards.
Miseong-ri: the lanes and the willow
The second stop is the walk itself. VisitKorea’s article says the road Hye-won cycles, the mountain where she gathers chestnuts and the house were all filmed in Miseong-ri, and it singles out the village’s lone large tree standing in the open fields — the willow in the cycling scene, a protected tree more than 350 years old, a short walk from the house. The article also notes a small local detail worth knowing: a village couple’s cow appeared in the film, praised on set by the director.
Walk the lanes slowly rather than ticking off markers. The village’s own account in the article is that residents planted the flowers along the lanes themselves after the film brought visitors, and the signs pointing to the filming site are described as rough and handmade — part of the place’s charm, not a polished trail.
Hwabon: the shop and the station
Hwabon Station is the trip’s second cluster. The station-front shop, Yeokjeon Sanghoe, is the safer of the two stops: VisitKorea’s article names it directly as a shop that appeared in Little Forest, the old-style supermarket of the film’s village errands. It is a working shop, so the guide treats it as a quick stop, not a photo set.
The platform and its 1930s water tower are the guide’s honest edge. Fan scene-matching pairs them with Jae-ha and his girlfriend’s scenes, and the water tower — built to supply steam locomotives — is the station’s landmark in its own right. But no official or press source was found confirming the platform scenes, so the stop stays fan-spotted and the guide says so plainly. The station is a working station on a live line: the article warns that standing on the tracks for photos can draw a fine under the railway safety law, and the guide repeats that warning rather than softening it.
Getting there
Gunwi-gun is a county of Daegu, and none of the four stops has a verified door-to-door transit route. For rail times, check the Korail timetable and local bus or taxi options before you go; the house in particular is a village stop best reached by car, with the village hall nearby as a navigation landmark. For other rural film trips on this site, see Christmas in August in Gunsan, When Life Gives You Tangerines across Korea and Toji, The Land, in Hadong.
How we checked
Hye-won’s House is confirmed: VisitKorea’s location page, VisitKorea’s Gunwi travel article and a Gunwi-gun news report from 22 October 2026 each name it as the film’s location independently. The Miseong-ri lanes and the station-front shop are reported: each rests on the single VisitKorea article, with no second qualifying source found on Oct 27, 2026. The Hwabon platform scenes are fan-spotted: one fan blog’s scene-matching, with no official or press confirmation found. Scene details appear only where a cited source states them. Transit, hours and fees are stated only where a cited source gives them; where the article’s own versions conflicted on station hours, the guide says to check on the day. How we label evidence is explained on our methodology page.
Sources
- VisitKorea: Hyewon’s House (location page)
- VisitKorea: Gunwi travel article (Miseong-ri filming area, Yeokjeon Sanghoe, Hwabon Station)
- Gunwi-gun food event at Hye-won’s House (Oct 22, 2026)
- Fan scene-matching: Hwabon Station platform and water tower (blog)
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