Updates for Playart DC coming June 2017

The DC Office of Planning (OP) announced today that three neighborhood partners have been awarded Playable Art DC installations through a competitive application process: Kennedy Street Development Association, the Mount Vernon Triangle Community Improvement District, and the NoMa Business Improvement District. The Playable Art DC team will now conduct design workshops with neighbors of all ages. Once the information is gathered, a call for designs will be released internationally to the public this fall. The three neighborhood sites include:  

• the small green space near the intersection of 5th and Kennedy Streets, NW;
• a section of K Street, NW sidewalk and tree box near 5th and K Streets, NW in the heart of Mount Vernon Triangle; and
• along the Metropolitan Branch Trail between L and M Streets, NE in NoMa.
 
Playable Art DC is a play and place-making initiative of the DC Office of Planning (OP) in partnership with the District Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR) to bring innovative art-based play spaces to neighborhoods with underserved park space in the District through an international design competition. Playable Art DC promotes the use of art as a means of creating new types of play spaces in areas that are constrained by space, topography, or other barriers like busy streets. Playable Art DC also seeks to engage the whole community in play as a way to promote fitness and exercise and create community landmarks and neighborhood gathering spots. The initiative is made possible by a grant from ArtPlace America.

“The selected sites show the range of untapped places for play in the District, and we are excited about the potential to create new models for inspiring play design,” said Ellen McCarthy, Acting Director of OP. “We are thrilled to be working with such strong neighborhood partners, and look forward to announcing future partners in other neighborhoods in the coming weeks.”

Playable Art DC builds on Mayor Gray’s playground improvement initiative—a multiyear citywide play space project to evaluate and improve DPR playgrounds—by providing access to play for neighborhoods identified in the Play DC Vision Framework as not well served by traditional parks and open spaces.