PLAYscapes Design Competition results

Building Trust International recently announced the winners for their international PLAYscapes Design Competition. As the name states, PLAYscapes challenged participants to propose their ideas to transform neglected city spaces into interactive places of fun for local communities. More than 500 entrants participated, with many of their projects highlighting the use of sustainable materials and the importance of redevelopment and adaptive reuse in their local cityscapes.

The competition results include one competition winner, one student category winner, and nine professional category honorable mentions.

The competition-winning project, "Cape Town Gardens Skate Park" was designed by a multidisciplinary team from the City of Cape Town in South Africa. In the Student category, a team from Lusiada University of Lisbon - Faculty of Architecture and Arts won with their entry, "Bring a Pal and have fun."

The jury included representatives from Building Trust International, Project for Public Spaces, BMW Guggenheim Lab, Landscape Architects Network, 3Space, Neon Stash, Land8, and academics and professionals from architecture and landscape design.

Scroll down further to see the winning projects and a few honorable mentions.

"The design competition asked for a PLAYscape proposal that creates community involvement and turns a neglected space into a place for public interaction and creativity. We are proud to announce the winning design as Cape Town Gardens Skate Park. The project team comprisesof Gerrit Strydom, Lwandile Gcume and Aline Cremon from the City of Cape Town, Errol van Amsterdam & Marvin Fester from C2C Consulting Engineers with Skatepark design by Clive Crofton of Spyda Ramps. The team developed the design through lengthy consultation with both local residents, skaters and the national body, The National Skate Collective."

"The jury selected the design as the competition winner due to its intelligent re-use of space transforming an under used and blighted underpass into a community led skate park. The jury were also very impressed with the high level of involvement and consultation with local residents and the future users of the park..."

"Gerrit Strydom, Winning team entrant said, 'For the project to be selected as the winning submission, not only serves to internationally recognise the merit of the project in itself, but stands testament to the importance and value of the broader dialogue about the abundant opportunities foractivating difficult public spaces for the benefit of diverse set of users. By elevating the status and awareness of the project the award will stimulate the proliferation of similar initiatives across the metropolitan region and cities in South Africa.'"

"Scott Renwick, Founder/Director of Landscape Architects Network, said, 'The winning professional entry met all the criteria, not only is it creative, but it can be applied NOW, making an instant impact to the local environment and enhancing the social dynamic of the community. Further more this design can be adapted and used throughout multiple sites, making it a strong and appropriate concept to win this competition.'

The overall submissions were fantastic, the level of creativity was mind-blowing which may of played against some entrants in meeting the criteria of the competition. It was a pleasure to judge and see the work of so many talented people trying to make a positive change in this world - the futures looking bright!'"

"The winning entry from the Student category has been announced as ‘Bring a Pal and have fun’ by a team from Lusiada University of Lisbon, Faculty of Architecture and Arts. Student team member Ricardo Morais said, 'Initially we decided to redevelop the space, building furniture equipment made with euro pallets, a material that is structurally sturdy, inexpensive and easy to find anywhere in the World.'"

"There were also 9 honourable mentions in the Professional category located in sites ranging from Melbourne to London":
‘Bom(PLAY)’ by Abhishek Ray (Mumbai); ‘Plant A Ball Parks’ by OP-AL (USA); and ‘Urban Zipline’ by Evgenia Batmanova, Katerina Sfyra, Giulio Bellizia and Dimitris Sparis (London)

"David Cole founding partner of Building Trust international said, '...The aim of the competition was to show how creatively we can make cities fun places with opportunities for interaction and play. The competition sought out fun and exciting new ways to get people to interact with the city on a different level. Regeneration of cities should not just be about increasing value and foot fall but should capture people’s imaginations making them want to get involved and experiment with new things.'"

All images courtesy of Building Trust international.

 

For more info, click here.