PLACE STUDY
The first PlaceLab project was an experiment: my graduate students and I went to a small wooded area between two city streets. We noted our first impressions, observed closely and made notes and drawings in our notebooks, identified structural features of the place, varied it in our imagination, and connected more deeply with the place so its features and intentionality could be disclosed. The process was very successful, and we developed it into a Place study method for researching the structures and affordances of places.
ELEMENTARY SCHOOL PLACE STUDY
The Waldorf School of Pittsburgh place study was a collaborative project with Waldorf School members, and implemented with the following goals:
1. The outdoor place should reflect the educational philosophy of the Waldorf School.
a. Outdoor spaces should provide children from pre-K to grade 8 with age-appropriate experiences as suggested by Waldorf pedagogy.
b. A healing quality should be brought to the place in order to make it whole.
c. A healing quality should emanate from places that children encounter every day.
2. We will respect the shared destiny of humans and nature.
a. Nature is honored and respected as the ground of all human activities. As adults, we want to model a respectful and harmonious insertion into natural environment for the next generation.
b. The natural place has its own integrity and intentionality.
c. We want to look at the outdoor place as a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.
d. The best landscape development practices respect and enhance the qualities of the place itself. We want to give the place itself a voice and discover its potential.
e. We Want to listen to what is there and what wishes to be there in the future.
3. The place study should involve the school community as a whole and gather the voices of adults and children, as well as outside experts and friends.
To see the full report on the procedure and results of this Goethe Science-inspired phenomenological study of place, refers to the Waldorf Place Study Report in our references section below.
123 BELTZHOOVER
In 2016, PlaceLab partnered with Dr. Jamil Bey to start a youth afterschool group on Wednesday afternoons for kids in middle school. The group consisted of 5-10 boys and girls, Dr. Bey, Dr. Simms, and 4 graduate and undergraduate students from Duquesne University. The facility at 123 Beltzhoover was an old funeral monuments company storefront, and there was some money available for small renovations. In order to identify what the youth needed and wanted from the place, we led them on a place study, modeled on the Phenomenological Place Study method developed by the PlaceLab a few years earlier. We took the kids on a walk around the neighborhood block and then through the building and asked them to take pictures of the things they noticed and that spoke to them, positive or negative. In the following sessions we looked at their photographs and discussed the kitchen and the front entrance, which the youth defined as needing most attention:
-
What does the kitchen/entrance feel like?
-
What is the kitchen/entrance saying to you?
-
What should the kitchen/entrance be saying?
-
What should the kitchen/entrance feel like?
-
What does the kitchen/front need?
PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND PLACE STUDY
Research has shown that time-spent outdoors in natural environments can increase children’s ability to pay attention, decrease physiological and psychological stress, improve self-esteem, and offers opportunities for connection and empathy (Louv, 2008; McCormick, 2017). When children and staff are able to decide how their spaces are designed (e.g. classrooms, schools, grounds, etc.), they can develop feelings of empowerment and self-worth, as well as a deeper sense of respect and responsibility for the places they inhabit (Jacobs, 2016; Thomas, 2007).
Based on these findings, we developed a novel approach to restorative playscape design that is embedded in child-centered, phenomenological and ecopsychological frameworks.
Key Principles of Restorative Playscape Design:
-
Knowledge about place is best generated by people who engage with it locally. Thus, place-based decisions should be made collaboratively by adults and children who engage with the place on a regular basis.
-
Children have the right to share their experiences and perspectives on matters that directly impact their lives, including the design and development of their local places.
-
Educators have the right to participate in decisions that directly impact their experience as educators, which includes the design and development of their educational spaces.
-
Places have a life of their own. The places we inhabit influence and shape our social and emotional life, just as we shape our environments. We acknowledge the mutual interdependence of human and nature.
-
Our workshops instill a sense of wonder and respect for the restorative potential of nature and place.