Playground Project

Between the 1950s and the 1980s, the outdoor playground served as a testing ground for social ideas. Designers in European and American cities, along with others around the world, created inventive, unusual and instructive play spaces. Artists, landscape designers, architects and campaigners set out to give children the finest possible place to play, and in doing so they also rethought cities and neighborhoods as a whole.

First published in 2018 and regarded as a classic from the start, this expanded edition brings the ideas of that era back for present-day designers. It adds many images that have never been printed before and new profiles of the people behind these projects, especially women, along with recent research on playground design. An opening essay places the playground where education, architecture, urban politics, design history and leisure policy meet. One substantial section traces the overlooked history of playgrounds in the former German Democratic Republic. Two early-career researchers contribute texts: one on the memory culture surrounding the Shek Lei Playground in Hong Kong, and one on the role playgrounds played in state-building in Mexico.

The book is a tribute to play in public spaces. It is intended for architects, designers, students, young readers and political decision-makers.