Project 0212
Diaz, Mariana / Maita, Stephanie | Universidad Centralde Venezuela
Project Statement
The idea of the renovated Kau-U Fong Children’s Playground is a unique and delicate three-dimensional structure formed with thin steel bars in a complex lattice pattern that seems to rise from the ground into the sky as a brilliant array. Forming climbing platforms and inclusive fun for all ages, meaning the park activities and spaces of the park are available and can be used for any age, kids and elderly people alike and being entertained.
The grid is a flexible, multi-purpose social space, where the walls, seating and roof are made of the same steel prisms. The complexity of the structure and its geometry is a series of interlocking prisms. The vertical bars have all different lengths with beams of light entering, creating a beautiful play of light while reproducing the bars in shadows on the surfaces.
The platforms create multiple levels of visibility within the park, standing from every point of the park you can observe the rest, that is reinforced by the material used to create the roofs, they are transparent creating a direct connection with sky.
The design of the structures took the trees as their base point, being the most important the central tree in the park, creating steps formed by the lattice creating a ring around the tree, said steps lead up to a platform that demarcates the principal entrance of the park as well as a slide that comes from said platform down to floor level. The park can also be accessed throughout the street at any point in its length by a series of steps that function as multiple seats for the visitors.
There are numerous spaces and facilities provided with the playground, including swings, a café, tables for eating or playing games and a gymnasium. The gymnasium permits children and adults alike to use the circles and squares on the floor to lead a series of exercises, a bit like the arcade dancing games. The park has also been provided with bathrooms, a shower, as well as a storage room.
The spaces as very open environments; when the boundary disappears, the constraints disappear, treating the user of the park as a part of the natural environment, permeated by wandering branches and overgrown foliage, the structure looks to destroy the boundaries between internal and external, striking to be transformative within its societal context and promoting the value of inclusiveness.
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