National Assembly Building, South Korea

The National Assembly building, an eye-shaped chunk of land in the middle of the Han river is on Yoeuido island. In the 1960s, Yoeuido island was just a ramshackle airport, but the politicians imagined turning it into a Korean Manhattan. To spur development in the muddy fields, the government constructed the National Assembly building on the west end of the island, hoping that its presence would attract private investors. The effort paid off-sort of, and now the island is covered with a dense mix of ugly apartment buildings and Western-style office towers. The National Assembly building was designed by committee and looks it.

The Japan's General Government Building (often referred to outside Korea as the Seoul Capitol) was the chief administrative building in Seoul during the Japanese occupation of Korea and the seat of the Governor-General of Korea. It was a neo-classicist building deigned by German architect Georg De Lalande, and was completed in 1926. Although the building was later the scene of numerous important events for the Republic of Korea, housing first the National Assembly and later the National Museum of Korea, it was long felt to be a symbol of Japan's colonialism, and was demolished in 1995 and 1996.

In 1910 After Korea lost its independence to Japan, Seoul was made the Japanese colonial capital. It was decided in 1911 to erect a building in Seoul to house the Japanese administration.

The new structure was a gray granite building with a copperplate dome in the form of the Japanese crown; its floor plan was in the form of the first character in the Japanese name for Japan, Nippon. Architect De Lalande, who had lived in Japan since 1901 and had designed numerous administrative buildings there, died in 1914 and was succeeded on the project by Japanese architect Nomura Ichiro. Construction began on June 25, 1916, and the structure was officially opened ten years later.

For many years the building was Seoul's largest and most impressive only in the construction boom of the 1970s did it begin to be dwarfed by adjacent office buildings and skyscrapers.

The building's future was opened after Kim Young-sam became president in 1993. In August of 1993 year he announced that it would be demolished in the beginning of 1995, the 50th anniversary of the end of the Second World War and with it Japanese colonial rule, as well as the 600th anniversary of Gyeongbokgung. Plans were announced for a new National Museum. There was intense public debate on the issue, with Kim and other demolition proponents arguing that the building was a symbol of Japanese rule that had been built deliberately to deface Gyeongbokgung. Opponents countered that Korea, now a wealthy land, was no longer troubled by such symbolism, and that reminders of the Japanese era were needed; many opposed the move on the grounds of the expense incurred, and the merit of the existing building. (Other Japanese-era buildings, such as the old Seoul Station and Seoul City Hall, are considered landmarks of the city.) A proposal was made to move the building to a new site, although this would have been far more expensive than demolition.

Yet, demolition began on South Korea's Liberation Day, August 15, 1995, marking the 50th anniversary of the end of Japanese rule, when the dome was dynamited. By late 1996, the building was gone.