I'm going to start this one differently than my usual location posts, because this drama genuinely sent its production crew further than almost anything else I've covered in this series. We're talking Spain, Palau, and three different regions of Korea — Hadong, Boseong, and Jeju — all in one show.
I haven't made it to Girona myself yet, I'll be upfront about that. But I have stood on Seopjikoji in Jeju, in the exact spot where this mermaid fantasy quietly slipped into a much more grounded Korean coastal landscape, and the contrast between the two settings is honestly part of what makes this drama's location story so fun to unpack.
Let's get into where this one was actually filmed, why a sageuk-era folktale ended up filming in Catalonia, and what's worth chasing if you're planning your own trip around it.
Table of Contents
- The Premise — A Mermaid, a Con Artist, and a 16th-Century Folktale
- The Real Source Material Behind the Mermaid
- Filming Location: Girona and A Coruña, Spain
- Filming Location: Palau's Underwater Scenes
- Filming Location: Choi Champan's House in Hadong
- Filming Location: Boseong Green Tea Fields
- Filming Location: Seopjikoji and Phoenix Jeju, South Korea
- Insider's Insight — Why This Counted as a Risk for the Network
- Real Talk — The Plagiarism Controversy Nobody Mentions
- Planning Your Own Trip
- FAQ
- Final Thoughts
The Premise — A Mermaid, a Con Artist, and a 16th-Century Folktale
Legend of the Blue Sea follows Shim Cheong, the last mermaid on the verge of extinction, who ends up on land in modern Seoul and crosses paths with Heo Joon-jae, a brilliant and emotionally guarded con artist. Their story weaves between a present-day romance and a Joseon-era past-life connection, jumping timelines in a way that's genuinely ambitious for a primetime network drama.
It's part comedy, part heist plot, part centuries-spanning fated romance — and the production scope matches that ambition. This is screenwriter Park Ji-eun's follow-up to My Love from the Star, and she clearly wasn't interested in playing it small the second time around.
The Real Source Material Behind the Mermaid
This is the detail I find most interesting as someone who studied in Toronto and has always been curious about how Korean folklore translates internationally. The mermaid mythology here isn't invented — it comes from Eou Yadam, a five-volume collection of unofficial Joseon-era anecdotes, specifically a story in its "myriad things" volume.
According to the original tale, a magistrate named Kim Dam-ryeong was out on a spring excursion when he stopped at a fisherman's house by the sea. The fisherman told him he'd caught six mermaids — two had died from spear wounds, and four were still alive. When Kim looked at them, he saw faces as delicate as a four-year-old child's, with high noses and black hair, looking almost human. Seeing the mermaids crying white tears moved Kim to pity, and he asked the fisherman to release them, but the fisherman refused, insisting mermaid oil was even higher quality than whale oil.
Worth Noting: That's a genuinely unsettling little folk tale when you read the original text — the drama softens and romanticizes it considerably, but the bones of the story, including the character name Kim Dam-ryeong, come directly from this centuries-old record.
Filming Location: Girona and A Coruña, Spain
Production for the international segments started rolling in September 2016, when Jun Ji-hyun and Lee Min-ho flew to Spain for roughly two weeks of overseas location shooting. Filming specifically took place in Girona and A Coruña.
Girona gets called "the Florence of Spain" for good reason — its medieval alleyways and architecture are remarkably well preserved, and it's already a familiar backdrop to international audiences from other major productions, having served as a filming location for the film Perfume and HBO's Game of Thrones. The city is also home to the Eiffel Bridge, an early work by the same engineer behind the Eiffel Tower, spanning the Onyar River that runs through the city center — it's the kind of postcard shot that genuinely lives up to the hype.
Honestly? When local Spanish press outlets covered the filming, Lee Min-ho and Jun Ji-hyun ended up on the front page of the regional paper Diario de Girona. That's a level of international production attention that very few Korean dramas were generating back in 2016, even with the My Love from the Star momentum already behind this team.
Filming Location: Palau's Underwater Scenes
The mermaid's underwater sequences were filmed in Palau, the Pacific island nation already well-established as a premium international travel destination thanks to its famously clear waters. Behind-the-scenes footage that circulated during production showed Jun Ji-hyun's swimming ability genuinely impressing crew and viewers alike — she's seen gliding through visibly transparent water alongside actual fish, looking convincingly like she belongs there.
Filming Location: Choi Champan's House in Hadong
Back on Korean soil, the production used Choi Champan's House in Hadong for several of the drama's period-set flashback sequences. This isn't a set built for this specific show — it's a preserved traditional residence representing the kind of aristocratic Joseon-era household architecture that location scouts return to again and again for sageuk-adjacent productions.
Insider's Insight: I think this location choice quietly does a lot of work for the drama's tone. Without it, the past-life timeline could easily feel disconnected from the present-day Seoul scenes. Grounding the flashbacks in genuine traditional architecture gives the time-jumping structure a stability it would otherwise lack.
Filming Location: Boseong Green Tea Fields
The sweeping green tea terraces of Daehan Dawon in Boseong make an appearance as well — these rolling, perfectly manicured hillside fields are one of Korea's most photographed agricultural landscapes, and they've shown up in a long list of Korean productions for exactly that reason. The visual rhythm of the terraced rows photographs almost unnaturally well, which is probably why so many productions keep coming back to this specific tea farm.
Filming Location: Seopjikoji and Phoenix Jeju, South Korea
This is the location closest to my own travels, and the one I'd point you toward first if you only have time for one. Seopjikoji sits along Jeju's eastern coastline near Seongsan Ilchulbong, and it's known for dramatic coastal cliffs paired with vivid yellow canola flower fields that bloom across the area — it's been a popular filming location for a long string of Korean dramas and films stretching back years before this show used it.
The drama specifically used the observation restaurant at Phoenix Jeju, located in the broader Seopjikoji area, for several key scenes. Real Talk: What gets me about this spot every time I visit is how the ocean view manages to look almost too perfect, like a set designer adjusted the horizon line. It hasn't — that's just what this particular stretch of Jeju's coast actually looks like.
Insider's Insight — Why This Counted as a Risk for the Network
It's easy to look at this now, with Jun Ji-hyun and Lee Min-ho's names attached, and assume this was a guaranteed hit from day one. But going into a fantasy-heavy, multi-country production with this level of budget and a director and writer pairing untested at this scale was a genuine gamble for SBS.
The bet paid off fast. The first two episodes pulled in nationwide ratings of 16.4% and 15.1% respectively according to AGB Nielsen data, immediately signaling this was tracking toward a major hit rather than a risky experiment.
Real Talk — The Plagiarism Controversy Nobody Mentions
I think it's worth being upfront about this rather than pretending every hit drama's production history is spotless. Legend of the Blue Sea faced a plagiarism allegation, with a claim that it copied the screenplay of a film called Haewolnyeo: The Legend of the Sea. Korean prosecutors ultimately ruled there was no case to pursue, determining there was no realistic possibility that screenwriter Park Ji-eun or the production company had seen or known about the screenplay in question beforehand, and that there weren't meaningful similarities between the two works.
The Part Nobody Talks About: Plagiarism disputes like this come up more often in the Korean drama industry than international fans typically realize, especially around big fantasy-romance hits that pull from shared folklore source material. It's worth knowing this context exists, even when — as in this case — the legal outcome clears the production.
Planning Your Own Trip
If you're chasing this one across continents, realistically you're looking at two separate trips rather than one itinerary.
For the Korea side: Seopjikoji and Phoenix Jeju are easily combined into a single half-day on Jeju's eastern coast, especially if you're already planning a Seongsan Ilchulbong visit. Choi Champan's House in Hadong and the Boseong tea fields sit in the same general southern coastal region of the mainland and pair naturally into a longer road trip route.
For the Spain side: Girona makes an easy day trip from Barcelona by train, and if you have more time, continuing on to A Coruña gives you the fuller production route, though it's a longer journey across the country.
FAQ
Q: Is the mermaid story in Legend of the Blue Sea based on real Korean folklore? A: Yes. It draws from a story in Eou Yadam, a Joseon-era collection of unofficial anecdotes, specifically a tale involving a magistrate named Kim Dam-ryeong encountering captured mermaids.
Q: Where exactly in Spain was Legend of the Blue Sea filmed? A: Production filmed in Girona and A Coruña in September 2016, with Girona's medieval old town and the Eiffel Bridge over the Onyar River being especially recognizable to fans.
Q: Was Legend of the Blue Sea involved in a plagiarism lawsuit? A: Yes, but Korean prosecutors ruled there was no basis for the claim, finding no evidence the writer or production team had prior knowledge of the film in question and no substantive similarity between the two works.
Q: Can I visit the same restaurant where the Jeju scenes were filmed? A: The observation restaurant used is located at Phoenix Jeju in the Seopjikoji area on Jeju's eastern coast, which remains open to visitors.
Q: How did Legend of the Blue Sea perform in the ratings? A: Its first two episodes scored 16.4% and 15.1% nationwide according to AGB Nielsen, strong enough to immediately mark it as a major hit for its network.
Q: Who wrote Legend of the Blue Sea, and what other dramas are they known for? A: Park Ji-eun wrote this drama as her follow-up to My Love from the Star, and later went on to write Crash Landing on You and The Queen's Tears.
Final Thoughts
What sticks with me most about this drama's production is the sheer geographic range of it — a Joseon folktale that ends up filming in a medieval Catalan city and a Pacific island nation before landing back on a Jeju cliff face. Not many shows commit to that kind of scale, and even fewer pull it off without the international segments feeling like a tacked-on gimmick.
Have you been to any of these locations — Jeju, Girona, or anywhere in between? I'd genuinely love to hear which one left the bigger impression. Let me know in the comments.
Explore More:
- https://www.kculture-insider.com/2026/04/perfect-crown-kdrama-review-iu-byeon-wooseok
- https://www.kculture-insider.com/2026/04/jeju-island-seongsan-ilchulbong-sunrise-peak-travel-guide
- https://www.kculture-insider.com/2026/05/best-korean-movies-to-watch-after-parasite-recommendations
- https://www.kculture-insider.com/2026/06/my-love-from-the-star-kdrama-filming-locations-guide
- https://www.kculture-insider.com/2026/05/korea-hidden-gem-travel-destinations-2026-local-guide
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