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How do we know a Playscape is needed?
Please please build your Playscape soon! I live in Lowestoft but will come over to Woodbridge especially with my autistic daughter as there is nowhere else for her to play.
This is what Jetty Lane Trustees were told when we received the Community Next Big Idea Award in the East Suffolk Awards 2023 organised by East Suffolk Council.
The design for the Playscape is born out of a project called Creative Play, funded by Arts Council England, Councillor Caroline Page’s Locality Funding, Killik & Co Partnership Charitable Trust and crowdfunding. The project has brought together 9 creative practitioners, a play structure designer, early years & neurodivergent children and their adults to inform the design. So far, the project has involved consultation with 217 young children & 179 adults (families/nurseries/childminders) during 19 artist-led play sessions. Creative Play is a project developed and managed by Lucy Keany in partnership with Jetty Lane. Feedback has been extremely positive with comments such as,
You are so needed for 101 reasons' parent of neurodivergent child.
We need more of this.'
So what is a Playscape?
Woodbridge has Playgrounds but it does not yet have a Playscape. A Playscape is different to a traditional Playground because it is set into, and part of, a natural environment. It provides opportunities for free, unstructured play and stimulates the imagination. It is a place that relies on and develops children’s creative play instincts, encouraging both shared and lone learning experiences, supports physical play, social bonding, risk taking and discovery of the natural world while learning about environmental stewardship.
We are planning to construct an accessible, multi-functional Playscape, which will serve as an inspirational cultural asset for young & neurodivergent children for more than 50 years. As a new hub for outdoor arts, the flexible design will be able to support a varied programme through the inclusion of structures with overhead rigging points & fixtures for a variety of applications such as workshops/performances/events.
Where will the Playscape be?
The Playscape will be constructed on the Jetty Lane site at Kingston Road, Woodbridge, Suffolk, IP12 4BA.
Part of a bigger Project.
The Playscape is part of the wider Jetty Lane build project to create a Youth Hub in place of the demolished Woodbridge Youth Centre, bringing back into use 365m2 of community land in Woodbridge. We plan to build the Playscape in 2024 as part of a phased build project and will be followed by two simple low-cost, low-impact buildings, a Work Hub and Youth Centre.
Jetty Lane.
Jetty Lane is a charity with the key aim of providing a site and buildings that enable partners to deliver creative opportunities to engage, unite and inspire local young people in the Suffolk coastal area to achieve our vision of promoting social and cultural connectedness and bringing our community together via arts, culture and wellbeing activities.
NOT JUST A BUILDING – WE INSPIRE HOPE, FACILITATE SUPPORT AND MAKE OPPORTUNITIES POSSIBLE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE