Imagining a More Playful Boston
2018 MONUM Fellow
“Wanna come over and play?,” five-year old me asked my best friend on the phone. What, exactly, we were going to “play” wasn’t defined—at that age, everything had the potential to be playful, from toys and games to cardboard boxes to sticks. As we grow older, and as we become more scheduled, some of that openness about play starts to dissipate and we begin to think of it in more confined times and spaces—meet me at the park to play soccer, let’s play on the playground at recess, come over and play this new game.
My summer fellow project with the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics (MONUM) was to test ways to get back to this youthful exuberance and re-expand how we, as a City, think about play: that it can be for people of all ages, in designated places and beyond. The entire City can be playful.