I designed this indoor playscape for toddlers and their caregivers.  It is located at Gessner and I-10 in Houston, close to the ice rink in Memorial City Mall.  The central play area is surrounded by a seating wall with planters and large arched windows.

At a budget of over 3/4 of a million dollars, its grand opening was noted in the local papers and TV.  It has remained a huge draw, with long waiting lines being a common occurrence.  And lookout kids, there was even a Michael Jackson Sighting a few years back!

There is a central castle with four flanking turrets in soft melting shapes, all polka dotted and candy-striped.  All the roofs are shingled and edged in colored plexiglas mirror.

Coming from the castle are various modes of access: a colorful sagging "log" bridge, a tubular rope net bridge, a curvy walled ramp that goes through all the colors of the rainbow, a web V-bridge, a tubular slide, and various brightly hued stairways.  Many walls have colored plexiglas domed port holes.

Floating overhead are the Sun, the Moon, and constellations of colored mirror balls.  The polka dotted lighting fixtures are by Kathleen Ash.

Surrounding the castle are 3 special areas.  The first has a small maze of brightly decorated spinning columns.  Another is a "water feature" with big bubbly waves with mysterious "eyes" peering out of the blue.  The last is a series of stepping pods which allow a child to get from one part of the castle to another without touching the floor.

There are lots of different archways and openings to go through, and a variety of degrees of enclosure to hide and crawl in.

These were the main design drawings used to fabricate and color all the components in the different work studios, and then locate them on the actual site.  Using the drawings as a jumping-off place, we did a lot of fine tuning during the construction phase. The base components were constructed by NBGS (the Schlitterbahn people) in New Braunfels.  The overhead constellation fabrication and installation are by Blue Genie of Austin.  Roofs are by Blue Genie and myself, with most of the curved pieces being heat-shaped in my own kitchen oven.