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North Korean authorities claim that the nation’s housing distribution rate is 99-point-eight percent. But it is said that the rate actually remains 60 to 80 percent. 

Multi-unit housing makes up a large portion in North Korea, with row houses and apartments accounting for more than 60 percent of all housing types. 

After successful socialist revolution, socialist states found it urgent to provide food, clothing and shelter to the people. They adopted industrialized house-building to construct apartments quickly. North Korea was no exception. 

While downtown areas of big cities in North Korea have a number of tall buildings, mid-and low-rise buildings are found in outlying areas. Two-story row houses are common in farming villages. In general, North Koreans live in multi-unit houses such as apartments. 

Major cities were rebuilt in North Korea after the Korean War. North Korea’s early-stage housing construction was heavily influenced by socialist countries because the North received their financial assistance and brought in their technology. 

It is said that socialist countries supported North Korean cities after the Korean War. For example, East Germany helped the northeastern coastal city of Hamheung recover from the war. The much larger Pyongyang, on the other hand, received aid from multiple countries including the Soviet Union and Poland. The socialist nations helped the North build industrial facilities and houses. Thanks to their assistance, North Korea was able to build infrastructure and develop the economy in the 1950s and the ‘60s. It is easy to understand that public buildings and apartments in major North Korean cities adopted the classical architectural style of socialist countries. 

A typical example of multi-unit housing in Pyongyang after the Korean War is the Workers’ Apartment that was constructed in 1954. Securing public facilities was considered important, while space for individuals or families minimized. For instance, North Korea set up childcare centers to ease the burden of childcare and housework on women.  

The Workers’ Apartment in Pyongyang had no ondol, or the traditional floor-heating system. Rather, it used a Russian-type stove called a Pechka. 

In South Korea, early-stage apartments were located in parallel to allow as many units as possible to face the south. In contrast, low-rise apartments that were built in North Korea in the 1950s and the ‘60s faced the street and had a courtyard, which is a shared outdoor space or garden. South and North Korea were different in terms of apartment layout. 

North Korean houses that were built right after the Korean War used the Russian-style heating system called Pechka. Afterwards, North Korea introduced the ondol system in houses, even before South Korea, to create its own housing culture. 

Under former North Korean leader Kim Il-sung’s instruction to find a heating system that would be fit for Korean traditional lifestyle, the country began to build ondol in apartments. At the time, installing the traditional heating system in apartments required new technology. That’s because old Korean houses were not multistory buildings, while the floor-heating system of ondol was not used in Western countries. So, North Korea attempted a new experiment earlier than South Korea. 

In the 1950s and the ‘60s, it was important for North Korea to quickly restore houses that had been destroyed during the war. The North turned its eyes to a construction method known as industrialized house-building. The method contributed to saving materials and constructing buildings relatively quickly to facilitate the housing supply. 

North Korea tried to provide many homes in a short period of time. That’s why it built apartments. To construct buildings quickly, North Korea applied prefabrication, which means building parts are produced at factories and then assembled at the construction site. This is industrialized house-building. But it was rather difficult to apply this construction method on the Korean Peninsula, where rainfall patterns broadly differ across four different seasons. South Korea also experimented with this method, which proved unsuccessful. North Korea brought in technology expertise from socialist states in Europe, where the industrialized house-building technique was highly developed. The key is to assemble building components stably and not to cause defects to arise during summer and winter. 

After Kim Jong-il became the official heir-apparent of his father and former leader Kim Il-sung, changes were made in many areas, including housing construction. Kim Jong-il described architecture as an art and stressed that imitation or repetition should never be tolerated in building design. 

The result was Kwangbok Street in the Mangyongdae District in Pyongyang. It is a five-point-four-kilometer-long, 100-meter-wide street. Cultural, education and convenient facilities as well as apartments line up on both sides of the street to form nine different sections. The residential section has 30 to 40-story high-rise apartments to accommodate 25-thousand households. The street represents North Korea’s wholly new housing culture. 

Kwangbok Street shows a major change in a new era in North Korea. Apartments there served as accommodations for athletes participating in the World Youth and Student Festival in 1989, just like South Korea’s Olympic Village. Previously, North Korean buildings were gray and solemn, with apartment complexes built in lattice construction. In a drastic shift from the rigid style that only focused on functionality, spectacular cylindrical apartment towers in Kwangbok Street indicate that North Korea experimented with curved architecture. Photos of the street show that the apartment complexes are huge and the road is wide. Signaling a departure from the typical urban redevelopment project that North Korea carried out until the 1970s, Kwangbok Street marks a turning point in the country’s development plan, in terms of building design and height. 

While going through the reunification of Germany in 1990, the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the death of former leader Kim Il-sung in 1994 and the subsequent Arduous March period, North Korea suffered from severe economic difficulties and food shortages. Construction of public buildings and houses stopped, with the country’s architecture on the rapid decline. 

It was not until the late 2000s that the construction industry revived. Changjon Street in the Mansudae area in Pyongyang, in particular, is a North Korean version of new town that was completed in 2012. The street consists of 14 high-rise apartments, including 45-story ones. 

Mansudae is an old neighborhood with historical significance. It is close to Kim Il-sung Square, the Mansudae Assembly Hall and various historical and revolutionary sites. There weren’t tall buildings around the area before the construction of high-rise apartment complexes, which destroyed the area’s historical landscape. How can this be explained? 

The Arduous March was over by around 2005. But it doesn’t mean the economy improved. Even after 2005, North Koreans still struggled with economic hardships for years. It was time to give them hope. Ultramodern skyscrapers in the Mansudae area would show to the people that they finally overcame such difficulties. The new buildings with sophisticated design would deliver a message that the Arduous March ended and the country should prepare for a new era. North Korea was so desperate at the time that it even compromised the historically important landscape to build a new street. 

Starting with Changjon Street, supertall buildings appeared one after another in new streets in Pyongyang, such as Unha Scientists Street that opened in 2013, Wisong Scientists Street in 2014, Mirae Scientists Street in 2015 and Ryomyong Street in 2017. Ryomyong Street has an 82-story apartment tower. 

Current leader Kim Jong-un built those skyscrapers in a short period of time to demonstrate that his regime remains undiminished. Early this year, North Korea’s official Rodong Sinmun newspaper unveiled a photo of the sunrise taken from the 70th floor of an apartment building in Ryomyong Street. Apparently, the paper highlighted the leader’s achievement by showing the scene of the sunrise seen from a high-rise building in the capital. 

Kim Il-sung resolved the housing problem through industrialized house-building and Kim Jong-il opened an era of tall buildings through urban redevelopment. The current leader also seems to show off his power through houses, although his approach is different from his predecessors’. 

The thing is, those high-rise buildings are for only a small number of people in big cities. In rural areas and farming villages, there are many outdated houses that were built decades ago. 

Basically, the freedom of movement is not guaranteed in socialist states. Socialists believe that big cities in capitalistic countries comprise a hotbed of social evils. In socialist urban development, therefore, cities are not expanded but their size is maintained at an appropriate level. For Pyongyang, however, urban development is focused on turning the capital into a city of revolution and an international city. So, North Korea spends a lot of money on construction in Pyongyang and enlarges its size. 

When I visited Mt. Geumgang in North Korea, I saw a very old farming house on the way. I guess rural regions were sidelined in the country’s redevelopment plan. In fact, North Korea is not well-off overall and Pyongyang is a special place. 

Early this year, North Korean media stressed the leader’s message that the construction boom in the capital should continue and the nation should open an era for local regions to change. The media also called for all regions to be equipped with construction equipment and facilities, urging cement production units to provide enough cement to cities and counties. 

North Korea aims to build 50-thousand homes in Pyongyang, with ten-thousand units each year. Unfortunately, the country’s housing construction plan is not proceeding smoothly, due to the prolonged economic crisis. To resolve the problem, North Korea needs to receive aid from outside or get sanctions relief. 

When the North announced the plan to build 50-thousand homes, construction of the Wonsan-Kalma coastal tourist zone was in the final stage. Without completing that project, North Korea announced the ambitious housing construction plan and held a groundbreaking ceremony. It seems North Korea thought that it would be difficult to maintain the new tourist zone even if it is completed, with the U.S. economic sanctions still in place. I think the North temporarily suspended the project in the last stage and decided to use materials for housing construction instead, which is essential for the people. 

North Korea is focusing on housing construction, but it doesn’t seem the project benefits all residents for now. Moreover, the country is unlikely to find a comprehensive solution to its housing problem as long as it is subject to international sanctions.