Plants and Play

My Plants and Play installation was a very exciting artist commission awarded by ArtReach as part of their Journeys Festival International 2024, located inside the beautiful and tranquil Leicester Cathedral.

As a continuation from my Plants and Place installation with Creative Leicestershire, I created Plants and Play as an immersive, interactive installation that highlighted the importance of play for our wellbeing, using the fun and familiar element of a garden swing set inside the stunning Leicester Cathedral. My installation was featured on BBC Breakfast, BBC East Midlands and BBC Radio Leicester. 

The suspended, interactive giant garden swing installation explored the theme of play as necessary to positive human wellbeing, through the playful lens of plants. The installation interpreted the swing as a universal symbol of play by engaging older and younger generations and cultures interacting in play together. The swing was centred around a suspended paper garden comprising of vibrant, giant flowers/plants such as wild roses, sunflowers, poppies, iris, and fruits such as strawberries, oranges and grapevines with ferns and foliage, bees – all intertwined around and trailing down the swing ropes. Exploring the idea of play as imaginative, nostalgic and uplifting, the focus of the installation was about how play contributes to positive human wellbeing, inspires community togetherness, and opened dialogue about environmental care as mutualism.

Swings have long journeyed through time, becoming a universal symbol of familial bonds whether in a playground or dangling from a tree branch in a garden. Whether they are made as constructs of young minds from a simple plank of wood/car tyres and some rope, to feats of engineering, swings invite invention to take place in wild open spaces or professionally designed for modern day, public use. Swings have the power to transform ordinary play into extraordinary adventures; nature’s own amusement park for elevating play to uplifting fun and laughter. They invite a feeling of nostalgia, weave memories into flourishing community spaces, spark the imagination of children and provide a soothing retreat for others.

My giant garden swing installation visually portrayed all these elements to provide a considered, lighthearted immersive experience for diverse family audiences to engage with – to connect inner landscape of human wellbeing with outer nature wellbeing through the physical act of play.

Creating a whimsical giant garden swing aimed to entice the imagination of visitors and also convey how outdoor play is essential to people of all ages. Visitors were invited to take a seat at the swing, immersed under a canopy of the suspended garden with calming birdsong audio, encouraged to look up and around the suspended paper-made natural environment, enjoying the natural light of the stained glass windows of the Cathedral – giving permission for play, reflection, nostalgia and creating new memories contained within a different perspective – essentially allowing the seat of the swing to provide visitors with the kind of gentle and supportive experience they seek in that singular moment of connection.

I would love to bring play to you! If you know of a setting that would compliment the installation, please do get in touch. I also deliver paper flower-making workshops to accompany the art work or as stand-alone workshops that are designed to bring together community, play and place.

There is lots more of Plants and Play captured on my Instagram page, please take a look for a true sense of the wonder felt by everyone who engaged with the work, including myself!