Playgrounds

The playgrounds project is part of an AHRC leadership fellow grant awarded to Ben Highmore and Hannah Field. It is centred on the historical investigation of playgrounds from the playground movement at the start of the twentieth century to the standardised and experimental playgrounds of today. It involves collaborations with colleagues at Queen Mary University of London and the University of Southampton to look at the material culture of play from educational toys to the digital environments of online gaming.  

The project will result in a book on the recent history of playgrounds (Highmore) an edited volume on the material culture of play and toys (Field, Highmore, Giddings) as well as various policy documents.  

The adventure playgrounds that emerged out of the bombsites of London and elsewhere; the vest-pocket playgrounds that sprang up in the wake of Manhattan’s redevelopment; and the more than 700 ‘doorstep’ playgrounds that were built in Amsterdam in the 1960s and 70s (all designed by Aldo van Eyck) suggest that a very different urban ecology is possible. What would our cities be like if playgrounds weren’t simply protected enclaves within a space inimical to children’s play? What if our cities took seriously the child’s right to the city and reoriented themselves?