Soviet Playgrounds: Playful Landscapes of the Former USSR

A photographic survey of Soviet-era playgrounds found in former members of the USSR, such as Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.
Through five chapters containing more than 150 photographs, the book documents the mass-produced, yet diverse play equipment installed in the communal spaces of socialist-era housing estates, such as rocket slides and earth-shaped climbers, spaceships and animal-themed ladders, cosmic roundabouts and bizarre objects that would probably raise safety concerns nowadays.

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From Riga to Dushanbe and all the way from Kyiv to Vladivostok, children dreamt of becoming cosmonauts, and enjoyed the many space-themed playscapes which had proliferated since the onset of the Cold War era. While some are still in use, others are slowly disappearing to make way for modern equipment, or, more recently, being destroyed during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, becoming only a faint memory of a Soviet childhood.

Includes a foreword by the Ukrainian urban planner Mykola Gorokhov and informative maps of the playgrounds featured in every chapter. Pictures were taken by Zupagrafika, with contributions by local photographers.

Russia
Ukraine
Belarus
Central Asia
Baltic States

Find the publication here: https://www.zupagrafika.com/shop/soviet-playgrounds

  • ISBN

    9788396326829
  • Title

    Soviet Playgrounds: Playful Landscapes of the Former USSR
  • Author

    Zupagrafika
  • Publisher

    Zupagrafika
  • Publication year

    2022
  • Binding

    Hardcover
  • Language

    English
Cite: "Soviet Playgrounds: Playful Landscapes of the Former USSR" 07 Nov 2022. ArchDaily. Accessed . <https://www.archdaily.com/991787/soviet-playgrounds-playful-landscapes-of-the-former-ussr> ISSN 0719-8884

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