“Urban Play is designed to take back the street… to give us the tools that let us install ourselves, our friends, our families, our games and our desires in what should be the space we all own collectively. Urban Play is the most promising experiment in not urban design, but designing the urban I […]

Throughout almost every major city in the world, individuals are taking it upon themselves to change their cities in ways that make them more creative, interactive, personal and fun. From small interventions such as a series of stickers that turn the London Underground’s Northern Line map into an interactive game to bold projects that transform chain-link fences in Chicago into public message boards, these actions fall outside of traditional notions of urban activity, and are quickly relegated to the margins, often labeled as subversive, underground, or even illegal.

Urban Play is an international project that believes this street-level inventiveness, energy and innovation is a window into a new form of creativity in the city. Launching in Amsterdam in 2008, Urban Play is a series of catalysts to inspire people to be creative in the city, to stimulate debate about creativity in the city and the way this might differ from city to city. Following its Amsterdam launch, Urban Play will continue to other European cities and will feature its own Second Life metropolis for global creative interaction.

Urban Play will launch with an exhibition that will introduce the notions that underlay Urban Play to the public: an overview of the most innovative examples of guerrilla design and urban interventions from around the globe that have manifested themselves in the past decades. At the same time the public will be addressed to contribute ideas on how to interact with their city.

These ideas from the people will all feed into a series of new commissions for interventions in the public domain to some of the most innovative designers. Utilising the infrastructure of some of Europe’s most respected design institutions, Urban Play joins the inventiveness and creativity of street-level activity with the talent of some of the world’s leading designers, architects and creatives to form a new type of creative spirit in the city.

Urban Play is Droog Event 2, directed by Droog Design, Amsterdam, in partnership with curator Scott Burnham. The first Droog Event, a design triennial, ‘Open Borders’ was launched in 2004 in the context of Lille Cultural Capital 2004 and attracted 50,000 participants during its run. Droog’s portfolio of innovative interactive projects also includes ‘Do Create’ with KesselsKramer which was presented at the Milan Furniture Fair in 2000 featuring products that were not complete until users put their personal mark on them. These projects, dealing with issues of open source, inventiveness, consumer led innovation and interactiveness, have inspired Urban Play.

Future Farmers made these bike wheel barrows.

PLANT LIST

pedestrian street mobility retrofit innovation

mobile structures compilation

surveilance manhattan

mocking public signage

In the next 2.5 months I hope to use this space for experiments, research, and reflection. I hope to keep my Lab Notes updated daily but the internet connection is quite bad.

This is the trip I took with another fellow (Victor) over the past 2 days. Victor’s heart used to beat as slowly as 30bpm rather than the typical 60-100bpm (the difference between a waltz and blues).

Greenlight is produced and manufactured under fully transparent conditions and documented on the visual wiki howstuffismade.org. The open visual account invites scrutiny and innovation revealing the ongoing optimization to the manufacturing processes, labor conditions and environmental costs involved: [2]

feraltrade.org Greenlight is distributed through the Feral Trade network, a social network running largely outside commercial systems that fosters knowledge exchange and accountability. The database offers dedicated tracking of feral trade products in circulation, archives every shipment and generates freight documents on the fly: [3]

Blown glass, multi-crystalline Photovoltaic cells encased in clear urethane, LED lighting technology, photosynthesis.

Product Description: Solar-powered blown glass overhead planting light

Inspiration/concept: Closed loop system design to address indoor air quality issues

Dimensions: Fixture: Height: 12-16″ with 9″ Diameter base Sunlight power station: H = 9″ W = 14″ D = 6″

Materials: Glass, low voltage LED light system, Photovoltaic panel, battery, control system, tropical & sub-tropical indoor plants which maximize indoor air filtration

Manufacturing Processes: Blown glass, multi-crystalline Photovoltaic cells encased in clear urethane, LED lighting technology, photosynthesis.

Greenlight is produced and manufactured under fully transparent conditions and documented on the visual wiki howstuffismade.org. The open visual account invites scrutiny and innovation revealing the ongoing optimization to the manufacturing processes, labor conditions and environmental costs involved: [2]

feraltrade.org Greenlight is distributed through the Feral Trade network, a social network running largely outside commercial systems that fosters knowledge exchange and accountability. The database offers dedicated tracking of feral trade products in circulation, archives every shipment and generates freight documents on the fly: [3]

Blown glass, multi-crystalline Photovoltaic cells encased in clear urethane, LED lighting technology, photosynthesis.

Product Description: Solar-powered blown glass overhead planting light

Inspiration/concept: Closed loop system design to address indoor air quality issues

Dimensions: Fixture: Height: 12-16″ with 9″ Diameter base Sunlight power station: H = 9″ W = 14″ D = 6″

Materials: Glass, low voltage LED light system, Photovoltaic panel, battery, control system, tropical & sub-tropical indoor plants which maximize indoor air filtration

Manufacturing Processes: Blown glass, multi-crystalline Photovoltaic cells encased in clear urethane, LED lighting technology, photosynthesis.