Ryan Gray Playground Lighting • Lawrence, KS

Background
In the Fall of 2002, three Lawrence neighborhood associations each received $2500 in grant funding from the City of Lawrence for projects intended to promote safety in their neighborhoods. The associations—all flanking Hillcrest Elementary School—agreed to consolidate their funds to purchase lighting for the Ryan Gray Playground for All Children. The playground is designed for maximum accessibility for children of all abilities, and was named in memory of Ryan Gray, a child who once attended Hillcrest School.

This project was completed in the Spring of 2003 by a Third-year undergraduate design studio. Design and construction took place over a seven-week period. This project was awarded an Honorable Mention prize in the 2003 Monsters of Design Award Program sponsored by the Kansas City Young Architects Forum.

Design Process
To promote the collaborative nature of the project (one project for twenty students), early work was conducted in small groups, which constantly re-configured themselves, based on natural alliances and affinities emerging out of the work itself.

Construction Process
The students formed themselves into 6 groups of 3 or 4 students, and each group became responsible for the production of one fixture. Students also had individual responsibilities to the group: one person taking responsibility for ordering materials, one for tracking costs, one for public relations, etc.

Final Products
The tectonic strategy developed into one of “bundled sticks.” So six distinctly different fixtures were constructed out of steel tubes and rods, attached to each other in a critical way. The ideas for each of the lights are as follows:
1. A light with an abstracted creature hanging on top of the pole;
2. A light with vegetative expression;
3. A light with square tubes in a mechanistic expression;
4. A light with with its bundle members expressed in space;
5. A light with a curved “sail” reflecting light downward;
6. A light with its tubes expressing the flow of energy from panel, to battery, to lamp.

click here to see photos of the project.