There has been a lot of focus recently about designing and updating cities through technology, rethinking old infrastructures, and so on. IDEO put out some of its own ideas, and the one that stuck out for me the most (no surprise), was Nazlican Gosku’s take on the value of play in a city’s ecosystem:
Play! In the last year, I have started chasing and capturing playful moments in the streets— from graffiti, to a group of kids playing in the water from a broken pipe, to lovers dancing on a street corner. This journey of capturing playfulness in the streets made me more aware and even obsessed with the idea of how we can design the right conditions for playfulness in the city. Why playfulness? Because playing means engaging, engagement brings care. If we are more caring and careful about the streets of the cities we live in, we might build stronger connections for healthier communities. Being playful on the streets requires courage, builds trust, allows for discovery, create communities. Playfulness is fundamental to our social nature, so it’s a useful framework for thinking through how we can build stronger cities and communities.
Thank you Ms. Gosku! So much yes in this!
- If we are playing with something, we are engaging and care about it, or will care about it more.
- Humans use play as the framework for our social structures, both in hunter-gatherer groups and on the children’s playfield.
- Play builds trust and community.
- It therefore also develops “buy-in” from communities who are more willing to invest in their cities.
Play NEEDS to be part of community planning, whether it is a small community or a huge metropolis!
Mental Flowers 