Children have a Right to Play safely as well as effectively and to Yippy, Playground Design is as important as product design. Whether it’s a garden or a large playground, we will come and visit your space and design a fun, flowing play area designed to suit all budget, age range and playing requirements. And if you already have a playground and you just want to add some Yippy fun to it, we will put as much thought into placing your Yippy items in your space as we would if designing it ourselves.
Playtime is the perfect time for young children to naturally develop their essential GM physical skills, and a playground provides an excellent place for this development. Climbing, sliding, balancing and running are all natural ways to develop these vital skills. We aim to design playgrounds and pieces that are safe and fun but also encourage children to try new things and develop safely. We create flow in a playground to encourage movement, space for children to run and climb, rides and toys to put the wind in their hair as well as places to sit together and places to hide or act out dramas and fantasies.
There are many criteria that Yippy take into account when designing a Playground, here’s a quick run down of how it works.
First, and most importantly we visit the site. Obligation and charge free. Whether it’s a garden space or a large play area we need to know the lay of the land. The surface. is it level, does it drain well? Are there any natural features; such as trees, hills or water that we can incorporate into the design. Where does the sun, and shade if any, fall at different times of the day? We’ll talk to you about any of our products or features you’d particularly like to include or anything you'd like to design yourself and have included. We ascertain budget, age range and abilities of children. Wherever possible, we like to talk to the children who we’re building a Play Space for also. Is there anything they particularly like to do at playtime? Some of the best ideas come from them!
Then, back at the office, we’ll work on a unique design for your space. We’ll design a Playground that suits the age and abilities of the children, with different age and ability areas if required. As well as suitability of the pieces themselves, things like height of equipment and angles of ramps and slides etc. can be altered depending on the children’s ages. We will incorporate all types of play, Active Play - both individual and social, Dramatic Play, Sand and Water Play as well as creating quiet places to sit and think or hide away. Natural areas - to provide opportunities to interact with nature and to provide for aesthetic qualities, shade etc. Open spaces for group games, sports and chase games.
As well as playing pieces we will add if required seating and tables. For the children, but also some adult seating for Teachers / Parents etc. when watching and we can also supply large group children’s seating to allow for Teacher to Child talks and presentations etc.
The spacing of the design is key, Yippy allows at least 6 feet around any separate higher playing pieces and STRONGLY RECOMMENDS, although cannot insist, that within this 6 feet around each piece of higher equipment to a depth of approx. 24cm we install a soft, shock absorbing surface such as sand. Please talk to us, we can quote and supply for this separately.
Finally, we add our joining pieces. Flow in a Playground is very important, observations by professionals who have spent much time watching how children play and use equipment in play environments have clearly shown that children spend more time using different pieces of equipment and show an increase in the complexity and variety of their play (not only as individuals but also as a social/group participants) when equipment choices are linked together.
Yippy designs playgrounds with linking items between all the key pieces to keep movement flowing. Simply, children have more fun and play more effectively if there is a route around their playground to follow. So in a Yippy Playground, when you get to the bottom of the slide or pop your head out of the tunnel, there should be a trail or a ladder leading off somewhere intriguing ……
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| Illustration by Vishwas Thoke |
