Abstract
When will parks open again and how do you keep children safe on the playground during a global pandemic? This is the question Martin and Claudio asked themselves when they designed Rimbin.
Rimbin: The infection-free playground inspired by nature - The Future Playground
Rimbin is an infection-free playground concept. Martin Binder and Claudio Rimmele are Berlin-based designers who have designed a playground where children could play together safely during the coronavirus pandemic.
Designer Binder and psychologist Rimmele set out to solve the problem of creating a space that both protects kids from potential contagions while still enabling fun interactions.
The resulting Rimbin concept is a playground made up of a group of individual play areas shaped like a cluster of Amazonian water-lily pads on a pond. The name ‘Rimbin’ is a combination of two words—‘rim’ for edge and ‘bin’ for container.
Each child can have their own playing platform, with individual paths leading to separate entrances, from which they can see and communicate with each other from a safe distance.
The children can also communicate with each other using the specially designed hollow tubes that run from platform to platform.
Elements that are exposed to direct contact with the children, like handles and tubes, are made from metal in order to be easily sanitised.
Each platform will house different activities within them, where some might be filled with sand others will have seesaws, ladders or horizontal hamster wheels.
Rimbin isn’t solely a reaction to the COVID-19 crisis, however. Binder and Rimmele hope the idea encourages more permanent change in terms of how playgrounds are conceived in urban environments, so that they can remain open should a comparable situation occur.
