Vehicles are parked in front of Olympic Park Foreon's model house near the apartment complex's construction site in Dunchon-dong, southeastern Seoul, in this January file photo. The apartment complex got the name as landlords decided to omit Dunchon-dong from its name in an attempt to present a higher-end image and use the name of its neighboring landmark, Olympic Park, as well as the word "Foreon," a portmanteau of "forest" and "on." Newsis

The apartment complex with the longest name in Korea is Gwangju Jeonnam Innovation City Daebang Elium Royal County in Naju, South Jeolla Province.

Raemian Mokdong Adelice, an apartment complex in Seoul's Yangcheon District, came up with “Adelice” by combining three foreign words — “adelio,” which means “noble” in Spanish, “adel,” which means “nobility” in Germany and the English word “cherish.”

Most other apartment complexes built recently in Korea have also adopted long names, inventing new words that combine the names of their locations and the construction firms that built the apartments. Each firm's apartment brand name — such as Raemian, Xi and Prugio — and other common name components — such as park, forest, river and first — is intended to distinguish apartment complexes from each other.

Their names have become more complicated in recent years in an attempt to exude a high-end image, but the Seoul Metropolitan Government's survey of 1,000 citizens last year showed that 77.3 percent of respondents disliked long and awkward apartment complex names.

Considering such complaints, Samsung C&T, Hyundai E&C, GS E&C, POSCO E&C and five other major construction firms here agreed last week to accept the city government's request to make the names of apartment complexes shorter and easier by using more Korean words in the complexes' names.

“Brand names are proper nouns like Hillstate or Raemian, but the other kind of names we're seeing are a big problem,” a Hyundai Engineering official said during Thursday's public hearing at Seoul City Hall. “Long and stylish names do not necessarily guarantee the quality of apartments.”

The city government also asked construction firms to refrain from using the names of wealthy neighboring districts in apartment complex names. Some apartment complexes in Sinjeong-dong and Sinwol-dong, for example, include Mok-dong in their names with the intention of raising their prices.

However, skepticism remains that the city government's non-binding guidelines could be ineffective.

“In the districts north of the Han River, landlords ask us to remove their village names from apartment complex names, so the nationwide consensus is necessary for us to make better names,” a GS E&C official said.

During the public hearing, a landlord from Yongdap-dong asked the city government to allow names that reflect neighboring landmarks, such as Cheonggye Stream or Mongchon Fortress.

The city government said it will finish drawing up the guidelines by the first half of next year after hearing more opinions.

“Based on in-depth discussions over the past year, we hope our guidelines can make the names of apartment complexes more beautiful and easier,” a Seoul Metropolitan Government official said.