PLACES for PLAY: Ailments and Remedies
This Photo Exhibition demonstrates that beautiful,
stimulating, tranquil and enjoyable places for play can and
are being created. Places for play include everywhere that
children can (or should be able to) play: designated play
spaces; pre-schools and schools; out of school facilities;
and shared public spaces, whether the streets or parks or
general open space.
This editorial highlights key issues that affect how play
is understood and provided for in the UK. It covers a number
of issues which have a profound impact on the way we think
about and provide places for play. We have captured these
ideas under the following headings:
We are also pleased to have an interesting comment from Paul
Collings of Timberplay about how "the constraints
placed within tenders often prevent the design of good play
areas..."
The Exhibition is not to be understood as a set of exemplars
demonstrating 'good practice', to be copied and then transferred
to other locations. Rather, the Exhibition - images and text
together - aims to illuminate general principles, values and
understandings that are widely applicable but which come to
life in diverse ways in different locations. How could it
be otherwise when we are so firmly of the view that places
for play must be expressive of an individual sense of place,
part of the wider, local environment?
We recognise that the current Exhibition has few examples from
the UK. We are also conscious that older children are not well
represented. In the coming months, with your help, we hope to
address these weaknesses. But for the present, the Exhibition's
task is to show what can be done and to present good examples where
we have found them.
The Exhibition represents phase two of our work on Places for
Play (Phase One being the Places
for Play booklet by Sandra Melville for PLAYLINK that we urge
you to purchase).
This Exhibition also marks a general PLAYLINK/Free Play Network
commitment to work both strategically - nationally and local
authority-wide - and 'on the ground' with local schemes and in
local areas.
We recognise that pictures and words are not enough; ideas need
to be worked through in particular situations, responding to local
conditions. Our aim is to make this Exhibition more than simply a
showcase for pictures and text. It is, for us, the foundation for
creating more opportunities for face to face dialogue and encounter
with you, who can help affect change.
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