Covid-KIT
In light of our current health crisis, our Summer 2020 Impact Project challenged fellows to ask, "How might we deploy existing urban infrastructure to relieve personal health and safety stressors of being outside in a public space while also counteracting the negative effects of isolation?” In response, fellows proposed the design of a dynamic visual language for pedestrian spaces within the public realm. This language addresses the individual needs of spaces of movement, rest, and play, and seeks to use social distancing guidelines as instruments to bring people together, safely, rather than keep them apart.
Multi-Game Play Circles are a set of two 8’5” diam. variety game boards which use four square, hopscotch, and skee-ball as the foundation for socially distant imaginative play. Built into the boards are four player markers spaced 6’ apart with a 6’ circle and square superimposed as a system of measure to create awareness of distance. Play Circles provide a basic framework for play with enough abstraction to allow kids and adults to invent their own games. Boards can be engaged with the body alone, or with chalk, balls, discs, or found materials which expand the possibilities of playing together while staying apart. Designed to be a part of school yards or public playgrounds, Play Circles could be utilized on sidewalks, parking lots, or indoors within recreational centers, classrooms, or gyms. Deployable indoor boards can be rolled out and stored away while permanent outdoor boards can be affixed directly onto asphalt for lasting play. Play circles offer a flexible setting for teachers, parents, kids, and adults to invent creative ways to play without physical contact, expand classrooms outdoors, and enable users to occupy public space safely and joyfully.
Sensible Spacers activate sidewalk control joints as wayfinding and physical distancing markers to help pedestrians navigate public space safely while creating shared moments of collective joy.Typically spaced 4-6ft apart, control joints are embedded within the visual identity of sidewalks often fading into the background of daily walks unnoticed by passers by. Activating the presence of the expansion joint line through a confined painted area enables communities to take agency over their sidewalks while cueing walkers of safe spacing distances. Through branding opportunities with local small businesses and community partnerships with neighborhood schools, Sensible Spacers work to weave the visual language of the sponsoring organization onto adjacent sidewalks. The project aims to create inclusive ways to re-engage with the outdoors in a safe, socially distant way, building upon the ubiquitous lines of a spatial system already embedded within our city streets.
Rest Spots allow territorialized moments of pause within an otherwise fast-paced sidewalk context. Massive circles, twelve feet in diameter and filled with vibrant art, communicate visibly expected amounts of personal space for those who need to pause along thoroughfares. Whether it’s to take a phone call, pick up a book or a drink, or tend to a child, the desire for personal space within the public realm has been exacerbated by the current health crisis. We propose a network of rest spots to facilitate the pedestrian need for personal space within the hustle and bustle of every day life. The size, location, and vibrancy of Rest Spots allows for their vertical expansion onto walls, benches, lampposts, or other urban infrastructure. By extending the circles into the vertical dimension, these murals gain multidimensional landmark status that can be anticipated from a distance, allowing users to identify their presence and plan their trajectory within an otherwise dense, busy street. We propose the deployment of these artistic spots of rest through collaboration between small businesses and local artists. Small businesses can sponsor a Rest Spot on or adjacent to their storefront; local artists are then recruited to work with the business to develop a design that is reflective of the communities values.
Together, Multi Game Play Circles, Sensible Spacers, and Rest Spots comprise Covid-KIT, a tool kit which equips communities with the instruments and ideas to re-imagine their existing urban infrastructure for safe reoccupation of public space, during, and after our current health crisis.
2020 Impact Wrkshp Fellows:
Tracy Llewellyn, Multi Game Play Circles Project Lead
Kemper Fagan, Sensible Spacers Project Lead
Hailey Windsor, Rest Spots Project Lead
Design Director:
Irina Schneid, AIA