Dezeen Magazine

City Dog Adventure by Maartje Dros

Dutch designer Maartje Dros created a play space for both children and dogs for design biennale ExperimentaDesign2008 in Amsterdam.

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City Dog Adventure is a reaction against the way many urban areas are "becoming no-go areas for dogs" and proposes a new type of urban space that can be enjoyed by "dogs and their owners, as well as toddlers and skaters".

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The project was commissioned by Dutch design collective Droog.

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Photos are by Rachel Sender.

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Here's some info from Dros:

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Maartje Dros presents for DROOG at ExperimentaDesign2008

City Dog Adventure; play space for the city dog

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This project will result in dog play and training experiments, and will introduce a new urban playscape especially for dogs. Join us and discover how playgrounds and dog fields can be the same thing.

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More and more, playgrounds and sports pitches are getting fenced in, becoming no-go areas for dogs. Dog clubs are banished to the fringes of the city, and the worlds of children and dogs are strictly separated by gates and prohibition signs.

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City Dog Adventures seeks to down these fences and will explore how the city’s play spaces can be shared by dogs and their owners, as well as toddlers and skaters.

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The fences are transformed into new play elements for dog lovers and their best friends. At evenings and during weekends, accompanied by Amsterdam’s Cynologists (dog experts) Club, we will look for room for a new underdog.

As a part of design biennale ExperimentaDesign, from 18 September until 2 November, several exhibitions and workshops take place in the city of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

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Part of this is the Sunday Adventure Club, where DROOG asked five young designers to think about implementing a new program on several empty lots or places where there’s not much to do.

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At one of these spots Maartje Dros designed an object for dogs, skaters and children, where the coming months several workshops will take place.