In 2014, the Kayany Foundation, in partnership with the Community Development and Projects unit at the American University of Beirut, obtained a permit to construct portable schools for Lebanon’s refugee children to attend. They’ve already built three of these, serving 17 informal settlements in the region. A part of this project, led by non-profit design organization called Catalytic Action, is now focusing on constructing a playground that can be easily assembled and deconstructed, made from discarded materials found in the settlement.
“The first step ... is bringing education,” Riccardo Conti, executive director of Catalytic Action tells CityLab. “The second step would be to offer the children a space to just be children.”
Conti and his colleagues visited the Telyani settlement in the Bar Elias twice, and conducted workshops with the kids there to engage them in the planning process. The ideas about playgrounds they heard from these kids weren’t much different from ones you’d get from children anywhere else in the world. Here’s how the non-profit summarizes these visions in a blog post:
The games/activities that were suggested by the most children were: swings, slides, balls, seesaws, jump-ropes and elastic cords. The environment that was most recurrent among the children’s ideas was a green space with flowers and trees; a place where they can play with their friends and relax. The sun was shining in their images even though sometimes clouds are depicted.
During their visits to refugee settlements in Bar Elias, Conti and their colleagues also noticed interesting recycling practices around the camps, which they found very inspiring. “When you live in a situation like this, people become creative,” says Conti. “We wanted to include that component into the design component of the playground.” The infograph below shows some of the interesting ways refugees used discarded and broken materials