Plug & play : re-imagineering the park- development of new park furniture design guideline and placemaking strategy

Abstract

In Hong Kong, park furniture is usually considered as a utility which provides a single function such as sitting or rest taking in public space. This applied research explored alternative park furniture solutions in perspective of community design and creative citizenship to the standard Government's design through prototyping and co-creation approaches. It questioned and explored different park furniture typologies and alternative user interactions to address the constraints and opportunities at policy, administrative, and users level. To foster the global outlook of Hong Kong through the exploration of twenty innovative park furniture solutions to the standard design used by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR), my team and another three architects were appointed by the HKSAR as guest curators to carry out twenty park furniture experiments at twenty different sites in Hong Kong under the theme “Seats-Together” in 2016 to 2020. I curates five projects and nominated five design teams with different backgrounds to enable wider spectrum of design approaches and experiences to the public. The research team has identified that the citizens not only accept new typologies of park furniture, relatedly open-ended design also receive positive user's feedback. The new installations facilitate more alternative and creative user driven activities. For instance, some parks become a popular place-making platform in Hong Kong. The team perceives that the government officers (e.g., park managers) become more relax and open to the new initiatives. The awarded project brings in confidence to the government on carrying out more creative usages. According to the figures from the Government at end of September 2019, over 5.8 million park visitors (all twenty parks) were observed since the opening of the part at July 2017. Brian will be commissioned by the government from the end of 2019 to early 2021 to conduct a qualitative analysis of the relationships of the twenty different park furniture typologies and user's interactions at diversified environment. The factors will be correlated to the design impacts which will inform the formulation of a park furniture design guideline for the government who can establish appropriate public park design policy in future. The funding amount is HK$649,000.