November 2, 2011

We May Now Rebuild Enzo Mari's Big Stone Game Playground.

mari_big_stone_game2.jpg

Thanks to a DT operative who presumably had the good sense not to overpay for his copy of the small, 1969 book, I Giochi per Bambini di Enzo Mari, I think we have enough information to proceed with the rebuilding of the Maestro's 1968 Carrara playground, The Big Stone Game, preferably at a place with an excess supply of 2.5-meter slabs of travertine:

The dimensions of each slab are 1.25 by 0.08 by 2.5 m. in height; those of the larger openings, 2.5 by 2.5 m., and the side of the delimited square is of 5.62 m. At the centre of each slab (at 1.25 m from the ground, that is, at the eye-level of a small boy) there are two small, identical, and elliptical holes, whose relative position (vertical, horizontal, oblique, etc.), in varying from slab to slab, adds to their individualization.

The interior is paved in slate at the same level as the surrounding green. With slate flooring, such signs and marks as the unconstrained fancy of children's play may demand, can be made.

mari_big_stone_game3.jpg
The whole--in its deliberate simplicity--has a "classical" dimension, and at the same time, has been conceived as a space for the collective life of children--a place for shaking off urban conditioning.
Shake off urban conditioning, my butt. Playing in all those hiding places and looking through all those peepholes will make your kid a streetwise urban ninja by naptime.

Don't give in to the unconstrained fancy of the playground soft surfacing industry's demands, either. Slate, no woodchips!

Previously: giochi per bambini di enzo mari""

1 Comment

Gotcha covered on the marble http://www.flickr.com/photos/proscriptus/2326136725/

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