Shed New Light on Local Diner — Illuminating a Local Diner Anew, Donga Diner

Five friends who were born and raised in Daegu are sparking a fresh wave for local brands under the old signboard that reads ‘Donga Woodworking.’

Interviewer : Parc Jinmyoung

Interviewee : Sung Juhyun (CEO of Peekychild Dining)

Why do certain travel destinations become popular? There are many factors—beautiful and abundant natural heritage, historic sites, an appealing local culture—but these days, social media seems to play an especially large role. Spaces and travel spots that once went unnoticed, along with various local events, are shared online and finally catch our eye.
I think Peekychild Company, born in Daegu, is a great example of this. Starting with Peekychild Dining, an Italian dining restaurant opened in 2016 by five members including CEO Sung Juhyun, the company now runs various F&B brands including Donga Diner and Cutlet. In particular, Donga Diner, which opened in 2019, is a local restaurant that embodies Daegu’s regional identity and sustainability, and it has become a popular spot among many travelers. They introduce well-grown local ingredients and the producers who grow them, crafting delicious seasonal dishes. It’s no coincidence that they’ve won over the so-called ‘climate generation,’ who care deeply about healthy, sustainable food.

Please give us a brief introduction to Donga Diner.
At Donga Diner, we make food by looking at familiar things in a new light. We use ingredients that are familiar to the region to introduce seasonal dishes in our own way.

You offer dishes like mackerel somyeon (thin wheat noodles) and perilla oil bibim-myeon (mixed noodles), which sound mouthwatering just from the names. What ingredients go into each?
The signature dish changes with the season. In spring and summer, we serve perilla oil bibim-myeon, and in fall and winter, mackerel somyeon. The perilla oil used in the bibim-myeon comes from Yongdae Mill in Gunwi, Gyeongsangbuk-do, and the mackerel somyeon is made with noodles from Daegu Jemyeon and salted mackerel from Tongyeong, Gyeongsangnam-do. Another signature dish at Donga Diner is egg gimbap, and the eggs are also sourced from Gyeongbuk Farm here in Daegu.

Before Donga Diner, you first opened the Italian restaurant Peekychild Dining. Since then, you’ve expanded into founding an F&B branding company. What led you to start this journey?
As you mentioned, Peekychild Dining was the beginning of Peekychild Company. Five of us, including myself, who had all worked in the F&B industry, came together to open the restaurant we most wanted to run. Through many trials and errors, we came to understand the unique characteristics of F&B brands, and we wanted to share what we’d learned with various local brands. Peekychild Company creates local brands with content that reflects regional character. We currently run Peekychild Dining, Donga Diner, the classic-style pork cutlet restaurant Cutlet, and a barbecue restaurant called Meatfield located in Yeongju, Gyeongsangbuk-do. Meatfield, which opened this past January, serves dishes that blend Texas-style American barbecue with local specialties from Yeongju.

What led you to develop an interest in ingredients and sustainable food?
I think it was around the third year of running Peekychild Dining. It was a tough but rewarding time, and the core question we kept coming back to was our brand’s sustainability. Looking back, I realized that our most meaningful competitive edge was “dishes that let you feel the seasons through local ingredients.” In the end, I think our interest grew naturally out of wanting to raise our brand—like a child of ours—to be healthy and long-lasting.

I heard you also run a brand called ‘Shed New Light,’ which organizes performances and exhibitions.
Shed New Light was launched to address a certain cultural thirst. Compared to the greater Seoul area, the regions tend to have fewer spaces and opportunities to enjoy culture. Rather than just lamenting this reality, we decided to take action ourselves. We’ve used the profits generated by our F&B brands to run exhibitions and performances. Recently we’ve been focusing on other outside projects, so it’s on a bit of a hiatus, but we plan to soon run it with its own business model.

How has the response been? Is there a performance or project that stands out most in your memory?
All the projects are memorable, but a performance called ‘Sprouting’ stands out the most. It was a project we planned in 2021, at the height of the pandemic. It was a single performance that flowed from a play called “Land” into a meal centered on namul (seasoned vegetables). Designing the menu to connect with the play was fun, and the audience response was great, which made it all the more meaningful. Unfortunately, due to tightening pandemic restrictions, we weren’t able to share the meal together, but seeing the passion from both the actors and the audience was moving for us as well.

Let’s go back to talking about Donga Diner. What’s the reasoning behind keeping the old signboard as is?
Before Donga Diner opened, the building was used as a woodworking shop. The owner was an old man who had spent his entire life working as a carpenter in that very spot. Keeping the sign was our way of honoring the spirit of a man who quietly walked his own path with true craftsmanship.

What did you pay the most attention to when designing the space for Donga Diner?
Turning a space that had been a woodworking shop for so many years into a restaurant required a lot of changes—it had to be optimized for dining, after all. But one thing we insisted on keeping, even if it meant some inconvenience, was the main beam. We didn’t want to touch it, because we didn’t want to lose the identity of the space.

What do you think is the most important factor for local restaurants like Donga Diner to remain sustainable?
I think you need to change appropriately with the times. At Donga Diner, we change the menu with each seasonal period to guard against the brand image growing stale. What’s important here is staying true to the brand’s essence. Even as things change, you need to keep in mind what mattered most when the brand first began. For Donga Diner, that essence was local ingredients and seasonal food.

What are your future plans or goals?
We have a local beer brand in the works, and we’re also considering a stay-hotel concept. Recently we held a workshop to take time to strengthen our foundations. Based on all our experiences so far, we want to create content that’s uniquely our own. If we keep quietly doing what we love and do best, just as we always have, maybe someday we’ll become a representative F&B brand for Daegu—much like Sungsimdang is for Daejeon.

3 Spots Recommended by Daegu Native Sung Juhyun
a.nook Apsan(@a.nook_)
a.nook, a local Daegu coffee brand, aims for an honest food culture you can trust every day. Along with its Sincheon-dong location (a.nook), it has branches in Maeho-dong (a.nook April) and Beomeo-dong (a.nook Bakers), among others. Among these, I recommend a.nook Apsan in Daemyeong-dong. The store has four floors in total, and from the rooftop at the very top, you can take in the whole of downtown Daegu spreading out in every direction. 459 Apsansunhwan-ro, Daemyeong 9(gu)-dong, Nam-gu, Daegu

Ghost Books(@ghost__books)
A bookstore and independent publishing space run jointly by illustrator Ryu Eunji and writer Kim Incheol. Here, visitors can encounter creative works in various forms—writing, illustration, and photography—alongside projects such as book-making workshops and exhibitions. 3F, 212 Gyeongsanggamyeong-gil, Jung-gu, Daegu

Sayuwon
An arboretum, mountain garden, and space for contemplation, Sayuwon is located in Gunwi-gun, about an hour’s drive from downtown Daegu. It’s a wonderful place to stroll along paths that trace the ridges and valleys of Palgongsan, taking in the seasonal winds that sweep through the mountain terrain. 1150 Chisanhyoryeong-ro, Bugye-myeon, Gunwi-gun, Daegu