Description

UKABI is a spring playground structure developed through collaboration among physician Hiroyuki Benitani—who also supports children requiring medical care—playground designers, and local community members.
Children with physical disabilities who find it difficult to straddle conventional horse-shaped spring riders have often lost opportunities to play. UKABI was created to allow such children to play together with others, and through repeated trial and error, arrived at a new float-ring-shaped form.
By sitting or lying down on the circular seat resembling a flotation ring, users can experience a gentle, floating-like sway. The design enables children to intuitively sense how their own movements generate motion, providing natural feedback between physical action and sensory experience.
Where traditional spring riders exclude children who cannot straddle them, UKABI rethinks the form itself, allowing anyone to enjoy swaying in a posture that suits them. Even first-time users can experience motion and enjoy the response created by their own movements, just as able-bodied children do.
In playground settings, able-bodied children enjoy the sway in relaxed postures or rock the structure using their whole bodies, while children requiring medical care play freely—spinning on the seat or tapping it to create sounds. As installations in parks and public spaces increase, scenes of parents and children, as well as people of different ages and abilities playing together, have become more common. Even after play ends, the gentle lingering motion leaves an impression, as if the memory of play remains.
Awards
As part of the RESILIENCE PLAYGROUND Project, a development initiative for playground equipment accessible to all regardless of disability:
– 2024: GOOD DESIGN AWARD – Grand Award (Prime Minister’s Award)
– 2023: KIDS DESIGN AWARD – Jury Chairperson’s Special Award

photo by. Kyoko Kataoka