A Garden of Play and Fun for All Ages

Av Peter Nilsson
Publicerad Wednesday 24 September, 2008.

Mariebergsskogen is for many visitors their first gateway to the countryside and culture of Värmland. The area boasts an open-air museum, open-air theatre, a Naturum visitors centre and countryside walks in forests and parks.

The task in this selected architectural competition was to “create a fun, beautiful and inviting playground garden to help complement, enhance and strengthen the character of Mariebergsskogen”.

“It’s about time we questioned the traditional playground,” says architect Helena Bjarnegård at White. Modern apparatus and rational construction make playgrounds uninspirational. Children need more exiting, imaginative areas than that.

The playground garden provides room for creativity and invokes our curiosity. It’s also a meeting place for people of all ages and with different prerequisites and has become one of the most popular areas of the park.

The playground garden has been designed as two interlocking parts. One part aimed at culture with three themed gardens and another aimed at nature with a playground woodland, which in time will blend in with the existing forest and Naturum visitors centre. The cultural part has been designed as a classical garden with an entrance and three themed gardens (music, literature and art) gathered around a round open place.

These areas are surrounded by trimmed hedges that enhance this character. The round area in the middle changes character with the seasons. Water shoots out of a fountain in the summer and a grassy area is ideal for picnics. In the winter this area is turned into an ice rink with beautiful music playing on the loudspeakers.

“It’s an unusual solution connecting gardens and play like this. There’s nothing else like it in Sweden,” says Helena Bjarnegård.

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