To Play or Not to Play: Ethnographic Insights into Designers' Role Negotiations in Co-Creation Processes at an Adventure Playground

Authors

Rintaro Chujo, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
Yuchi Yahagi, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
Kuan-Ju Wu, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
Yuiko Fujita, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan

Abstract

This pictorial presents an ethnographic account of community-based design observed in a historical urban adventure playground in Tokyo. Focusing on university student designers who also served as play leaders, we examine how they navigated tensions between initiating designed activities and supporting child-led play. Through field observations and interviews, we identify strategies such as concealing role shifts, reframing activities as everyday occurrences, and adopting a watching-over stance to maintain childrens autonomy. By highlighting how design is negotiated through subtle, relational, and situated practices, this work offers insight into the micro-politics of co-creation in informal settings. The pictorial contributes to the design research community by foregrounding the challenges of role negotiation in participatory contexts and offering grounded strategies for engaging in co-creation without compromising local agency.

Keywords

Adventure playground; Drop-in program; Ethnography

DOI

https://doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2025.1008

Citation

Chujo, R., Yahagi, Y., Wu, K.,and Fujita, Y.(2025) To Play or Not to Play: Ethnographic Insights into Designers' Role Negotiations in Co-Creation Processes at an Adventure Playground, in Chang, C.-Y., and Hsu, Y. (eds.), IASDR 2025: Design Next, 02-05 December, Taiwan. https://doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2025.1008

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Conference Track

Track 6 - Co-creation