All Blog Posts Tagged 'play' (150)

Although the participants in last night’s Atlanta Mayoral Candidate Forum on Greenspace…

Click the image above to watch "This Is Me", a short video on the child's right to play from the International Play Association (IPA).

(This video was made by PlayAtlanta's Cynthia Gentry in her role on the Board of…

As a child of the 60s and 70s I have always savored the decades for their extraordinary music and profound cultural change - and the fact that I was so young then. It has only been in the past decade that I learned about the wonderful play design that was occurring around the same time. One perfect example is that of architect and play designer Richard Dattner and his PlayCubes. …

The Mayor of Calgary, Alberta Canada has released this video about the International Play Association Triennial Conference which will be in Calgary in September 2017. He gets it!! He really gets it!! For almost six years I have had the honor of sitting on the Board of IPA World and am thrilled that the…

Atlanta's Mayor Kasim Reed has been surprising me lately with some pretty cutting edge programs like a Department of Urban Agriculture, an Office of Sustainability, and now by…

Try though I may I have always found a definition of play to be elusive. It is like trying to define love. It is different things to different people. It changes. It is full of layers. This piece of paper is hanging on my studio wall. I took it from the General Comment (#17) on article 31 of the UN…

Is Atlanta ready for a new old kind of playground? What if we did an experiment in which we tried out an adventure playground like they did at Governor's Island in New York? This is an incredible idea whose time came, went and is back again! Think about it.…

I just stumbled upon an article I wrote for the Saporta Report earlier this year before Park Pride's annual Parks and Greenspace Conference. The conference had the theme of Parks and Play: A Conversation for All Ages and it was fantastic.

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I love the idea of play being everywhere, not just at the playground. When I was a kid (oh,…

This idea of a streetlight that makes shadows based on the memory of your shadow is such a fun idea. It was created by the design team of Chomko & Rosier for a Playable City competition in the UK. 

I know this is wrong of me, but I tend to not care much about playful designs…

  Janet Echelman       +     Alberto Adolfo, Fernandez Gonzalez and Carlos Benjamin      +       Hyunjeong Kim

The artist Janet Echelman spoke at the Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA) several months ago and I have been obsessed with figuring out how to create a play space with her ever since. She uses what are essentially fishermen's nets to create stunning, moving,…

Thought it was time for a reminder of the simplicity and beauty of play. Plus, I just love the way the song accents the children.

There is a very important article in The Atlantic titled, "Why Do Some Poor Kids Thrive?" It is a fascinating read about coming out on the winning side of a childhood of poverty.

A big factor in…

by  Guest Blogger Lianne Epstein Deren

Recently I had the delightful and rewarding experience of attending Park…

As you could see in my previous post we have had a grand new playground open up in our neighborhood. It was the brain child of Chastain Park Conservancy Vice Chairman Jay Smith. It has been a long road - over four years, in fact - to get this gargantuan task completed and one had to wonder how Jay kept the vision alive through all the ups and downs, and…

PARKS AND PLAY!! IS THE THEME

Monday, March 21, 2016 (all day)

Atlanta Botanical Gardens

It is incredibly exciting and promising that the big annual Park Pride Parks and Greenspace Conference has Parks and Play : A Conversation for All Ages as its topic this year.…

Who said play has to be on a playground? Not us! We love playgrounds, of course, but play is also funny and creative and artistic, and did we mention funny?…

Six years ago today I posted these pictures and thoughts about play being akin to a universal language. I have learned so much about play since I wrote this, but the words seem truer to me now than they did then. Play is fundamental. It is a basic right of children, because it is a universal truth, a common language, a requirement for a healthy and happy childhood. Back when I wrote this I didn't realize how ever present…

This is not an ordinary slide you see before you. This is the slide that three-year-old me slid down on the way to buy shoes. It was magic. The anticipation of arriving at the store that you entered via a slide is so vivid and alive that it is as if it happened yesterday, instead of (gulp) 59…

So THAT is what it feels like to fly! To be Peter Pan or Tinker Bell, or a Red-Tailed Hawk or a ring-tailed lemur... 

Still think play is trivial? Something relegated to "down time"? Do you think there has to be a reason to play - an outcome? What if we just let kids play? Play, just for play's sake, is more than good…