The Paris Foreign Missions Society funded the cathedral, and Apostolic Vicar Marie-Jean-Gustave Blanc acquired the site. The French priest Eugène Jean George Coste supervised the project, though the article does not call him the designer. The cornerstone ceremony was on August 5, 1892, and it was completed and dedicated on May 29, 1898, at a cost of about 60,000 dollars. The style is Gothic Revival. It was built with twenty types of locally fired red and gray bricks.
The main building and nave are 75 feet (23 m) high, and the steeple with its clock is 148 feet (45 m). The article calls it the largest building in Seoul when it was built. A crypt beneath the main altar holds relics of nine Korean martyrs.
It is the seat of the Archbishop of Seoul and Historic Site No. 258 since November 22, 1977.
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