The playground frequently seen today is a colourful collection of commercial equipment where use is predetermined, leaving little open to interpretation or improvisation.
Michael Laris a playground designer for
Kompan tells a story in
Children's Spaces (Dudek, 2005) of an important lesson he learnt:
Having designed a children’s castle, with accompanying turrets, battlements, an archway, a drawbridge...he went back to observe the children play. Here he watched as three boys ran over to the castle, through the entrance and under the arch. The first boy ran up onto the upper platforms, whilst the second hid below in the ‘dungeon’. The third stopped at the portal, took hold of a lever arm, (placed so that children could pretend to lift the drawbridge), and shouted, ‘anchors up, we’re sailing!’
"Sailing? My new castle, sailing?" thought Laris.
So he learnt, it is not the designer who decides how something is used, it is the children. And it became clear to him, the crucial need for designs that are less obvious, more abstract, and include a diversity of shapes and materials so that they are open to a wide range of imaginative interpretations – interpretations made by the children themselves.