Park Jong-seo Invests ₩10 Billion in Training Designers After Retiring at 57

EBS’s Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door featured first-generation car designer Park Jong-seo on the 14th, telling the story of a career that helped shape Korean car design and his later commitment to mentoring younger designers.

Park spent 25 years at H Company, where he helped create a string of well-known cars. He earned the trust of successive company chairmen, from the late Chung Ju-yung to Chung Mong-koo, and became part of the company’s history as Korean car design entered a new era. He began his career designing televisions at a home appliance company. After his work appeared in a well-known magazine, the late Chung Se-yung noticed him and appointed him H Company’s first car designer when Park was 33. At the chairman’s suggestion, he went on to study car design at the Royal College of Art in Britain. There, he used discarded black tape left by other students to draw car designs and, short of living expenses, sometimes ate instant bread on a bench.

The program also revisited stories behind Park’s best-known designs. He completed the Tiburon, with its dynamic shark-like curves, despite strong opposition within the company. The Santa was presented as the result of his ability to read global trends in SUV design. For the Scoupe, the Korean team beat an Italian team from a country known for car design; choosing simplicity over elaborate styling proved decisive. The program described the car as a milestone that showed the world the potential of Korean design, then emerging from a country with little automotive industry.

Park named the Avante his biggest hit among his many successful designs. Its distinctive lamps, likened to “goblin eyes,” became popular overseas. He said he intended the lights to look like a fox’s eyes to a car following behind. Park became the first car designer to reach an executive position as he helped lead the company toward independence in car design. He said he had received performance bonuses worth hundreds of millions of won, but gave them all to the employees who had worked alongside him.

At the height of his career, Park developed facial numbness and was diagnosed with a brain tumor. After surgery, he completely lost sensation and hearing on one side of his face. He left the company at 57, but continued working to develop the next generation of designers. He has invested ₩10 billion of his own money in establishing an “automobile factory” where aspiring designers can learn car design from basic principles through practical work. He said he was driven by the belief that “the power of design makes a country prosperous.”

Park said he drives a 26-year-old car himself, but hopes the cars he designed will serve as a foundation for many designers who can help Korea rise. Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door airs on EBS Wednesdays at 9:55 p.m. and is also available after broadcast on streaming services including Netflix and Wavve.

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