Playground equipment-The fundamentals of excellent play design
Playground equipment-The fundamentals of excellent play design
Budget. Available space. Fall zones and surface requirements. In playground planning, the practical considerations drive a lot of decisions, often taking up the majority of your time and attention. Playworld playground designers are acutely experienced at meeting those practical requirements. But our specialized training in underlying play principles makes all the difference—between a good playground and an excellent playspace.
It’s helpful to think about play equipment as furniture. You can design a living room by fitting furniture into a space and a budget. But if you stop there, there are lots of bad ways to design the room. Obviously, you must consider how humans interact—with each piece, and the room as a whole.
Building successful playspaces requires the same perspective: thinking about how people move through the playground, where they’ll gather, and how they’ll experience the space overall. Strategic play flow design can help eliminate “dead zones”—play areas that end up out of the way, overlooked and underutilized.
Understanding entry and exit points, play trajectories and resting areas, helps to maximize play value—not by controlling movement, but by facilitating awareness, access and engagement throughout the entire playground.
Quality of space and spatial divisions also make a big difference in play value. Some design elements, such as boulders, soft rocks and perch points have resting, gathering and socializing qualities. Other spaces have a kinetic quality: a slide, for instance, propels kids in a specific direction. By thinking about how these spaces align and complement each other, you can organize spaces for optimal user experience.
Spatial divisions also help organize and make sense of playspace layout. For instance, a contoured structure may have an “open” side that draws people in, with the other side “closing off” another area. This type of spatial division helps to define area for full play flow, and spaces for resting, viewing, and observing.
Spatial division also involves using elements to transition from one play space to another. Stepping stones, buttons and overhead climbing structures can act as transition elements, integrating different areas into a unified play space.
Many of the benefits of play involve cognitive, emotional and social skills development, making it important to consider sight lines in your design. Not simply for the important purpose of child supervision but also to allow children to see and be seen as they play. It’s how ideas are shared and developed, how games are invented, and how social bonds are formed.
Considering lines of communication will help you situate resting areas, gathering spaces and perch points strategically to promote eye contact, idea transfer and social interaction—creating great play experiences for kids and caregivers alike.
Budget. Available space. Fall zones and surface requirements. In playground planning, the practical considerations drive a lot of decisions, often taking up the majority of your time and attention. Playworld playground designers are acutely experienced at meeting those practical requirements. But our specialized training in underlying play principles makes all the difference—between a good playground and an excellent playspace.
It’s helpful to think about play equipment as furniture. You can design a living room by fitting furniture into a space and a budget. But if you stop there, there are lots of bad ways to design the room. Obviously, you must consider how humans interact—with each piece, and the room as a whole.
Building successful playspaces requires the same perspective: thinking about how people move through the playground, where they’ll gather, and how they’ll experience the space overall. Strategic play flow design can help eliminate “dead zones”—play areas that end up out of the way, overlooked and underutilized.
Understanding entry and exit points, play trajectories and resting areas, helps to maximize play value—not by controlling movement, but by facilitating awareness, access and engagement throughout the entire playground.
Quality of space and spatial divisions also make a big difference in play value. Some design elements, such as boulders, soft rocks and perch points have resting, gathering and socializing qualities. Other spaces have a kinetic quality: a slide, for instance, propels kids in a specific direction. By thinking about how these spaces align and complement each other, you can organize spaces for optimal user experience.
Spatial divisions also help organize and make sense of playspace layout. For instance, a contoured structure may have an “open” side that draws people in, with the other side “closing off” another area. This type of spatial division helps to define area for full play flow, and spaces for resting, viewing, and observing.
Spatial division also involves using elements to transition from one play space to another. Stepping stones, buttons and overhead climbing structures can act as transition elements, integrating different areas into a unified play space.
Many of the benefits of play involve cognitive, emotional and social skills development, making it important to consider sight lines in your design. Not simply for the important purpose of child supervision but also to allow children to see and be seen as they play. It’s how ideas are shared and developed, how games are invented, and how social bonds are formed.
Considering lines of communication will help you situate resting areas, gathering spaces and perch points strategically to promote eye contact, idea transfer and social interaction—creating great play experiences for kids and caregivers alike.
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