British Columbia-based LArch and urban design collaborative HAPA and WildPlay have opened a new ‘play experience’ for the city of Richmond, modeled on the landscape types on its arm of the Fraser River: intertidal foreshore, dykes, remnant sloughs, and past and present agricultural use. An area that was once a paddock is now populated with ziplines, hill slides, and a meadow maze, and the ‘homestead’, where a farmhouse once stood, has become a 10m tall ‘treehouse’ and log jam.
For community consultation, HAPA formed both a Big Kids Group (adults) and a Little Kids Group (children) to provide direction and feedback!
The statement of Richmond’s mayor at the Terra Nova opening is a good summation of what a ‘playscape’ must now strive to be, moving beyond yesterday’s equipment-based definition of a ‘playground’: “…more than just a park… a community gathering place where history and nature come together with modern-day programs that respect our heritage, while supporting our goals to be a sustainable, vibrant community.”
[images by Joshua Dool photography, via hapa]
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