Re-imagining Play

Fig: 1 - Rising number of refugee children of school going age

REFUGEES

Recent times have witnessed a shift in humanity like never before, more than 70 million people around the world are displaced from their homes. Fleeing their countries entirely due to persecution, war, or violence, almost 25.9 million of these are seeking asylum in other countries, becoming refugees. 

A staggering 52% of these are children.

Fig: 2 - Images of two different refugee camps indicative of the gravity of the world wide refugee crisis.

REFUGEES CAMPS

Intended as temporary accommodation for populations that have been forced to leave their homes due to war or violence, refugee camps provide safety and shelter for the world’s most vulnerable people.

With recent times seeing large-scale migration, camps are overreaching their intended capacities, and situations seem grave. Overcrowded, unhygienic, and violence-prone, these camps are home to people who are forced to stay in the camp for months, some even years, by the slow and heavily bureaucratic asylum process.

Fig: 3 - Need to priotize that children need to be engaged and safe

REFUGEE CHILDREN EMPOWERMENT

According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) out of a global population of 7.2 million school-age refugee children, four million do not attend lessons of any kind. Studies show child refugees are particularly vulnerable and are five times more likely never to go to school than non-refugee children on a global level.

How do we keep children engaged and safe, while also helping them overcome traumatic experiences? How do we help them develop the skills and abilities to make sense of their surroundings? How do we work towards helping them develop their communication, problem-solving & conflict resolution skills and let them know that there will be better days? 

Fig: 4 - Children looks happy while playing

BRIEF OF THE COMPETITION

In most circumstances, play can be invigorating, stimulating, freeing, and fun. Here it is much more than a fundamental form of therapy. A dedicated play space can ensure a safe and caring environment for kids to freely express themselves through the process of play. 

Develop an architectural concept creating a safe, stable happy place for children in an otherwise chaotic world.  Seeing this as a two-step problem, attempt to bring education to the children, and secondly focus on letting the children be children. 
Most importantly, make play the source of happiness it should be. 

OBJECTIVES

• Safe: Establish a sense of safety - one of the most basic needs of displaced children.
• Inclusive: Create a safe place where children of all abilities can play together.
• Context: Create a space that meets all needs of the context (Community).
• Resourceful: Allow the space to be resourceful in terms of conception and execution.

The following objectives can be a point of beginning to conceive this design. Participants can assume their own contexts and users before initiating their design process.

DADAAB, KENYA

Dadaab is a semi-arid town in Garissa County, Kenya. It is the site of a UNHCR base hosting 223,420 registered refugees and asylum seekers in three camps (Dagahaley, Hagadera and Ifo) as of 13 May 2019, making it the third-largest such complex in the world. 

The center is run by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and its operations are financed by foreign donors. In 2013, UNHCR, the governments of Kenya and Somalia signed a tripartite agreement facilitating the repatriation of Somali refugees at the complex.

SITE PLAN - MODULE OF INTERVENTION

The design site has to be conceived as an adaptive volume, which can fit to almost any space which calls for action. A singular module of 2m x 2m x 2m, is used sequentially to form a larger plot. The height is restricted to 4m, but participants may consider a variety of uses when put in different locations, multiple configurations or contexts. Keep in mind the probability of vandalism.