Villa Academy Natural Playground Design

Seattle, Washington | Nature-Based Play, Imagination, and Community

 

The Vision: Creating a More Imaginative School Playground

Villa Academy, a private school in Seattle, Washington, envisioned a playground that reflected its inquiry-based educational philosophy and encouraged children to explore, imagine, and connect with nature.

The existing playground was aging and heavily oriented toward competitive sports. School leadership wanted to create a more balanced outdoor environment that encouraged curiosity, unstructured play, sensory exploration, and social connection for children ages 5–11.

The school partnered with Learning Landscapes Design to develop a distinctive private school natural playground  that would support a broader variety of play experiences while preserving important sports and physical education facilities.

Collaborative Design With School Leadership and Teachers

Learning Landscapes Design began with a staff and teacher presentation, site walk, and collaborative design workshop. Together, the team identified opportunities within the existing campus and established priorities for the new playground.

The school emphasized the importance of inquiry-based learning, building community, and creating opportunities for children to direct their own play during unstructured moments throughout the school day.

These conversations informed a design program that balanced adventurous physical challenges with imaginative, sensory, social, and quieter play experiences. The goal was to create a schoolyard where children with different interests and play preferences could find meaningful ways to engage.

Blending a Voyager Ship With Natural Playground Design

One of the most distinctive aspects of the design was incorporating Villa Academy’s Voyager mascot into the playground.

Rather than placing a large themed play structure in an otherwise conventional setting, LLD integrated a two-story ship-themed climber into a landscape of grassy hills, logs, boulders, and climbing elements. Turf mounds form playful islands around the ship, while ropes and overhead ladders connect the adventure.

This approach combines the excitement of themed playground equipment with the beauty and flexibility of nature-based play environments.

The result encourages students to climb, balance, navigate challenges, invent stories, and create their own adventures within a cohesive landscape.

Making Space for Imagination, Sensory Play, and Social Connection

A central goal of the project was to offer meaningful alternatives to competitive sports and traditional physical playground activities.

The design incorporates a wide variety of experiences that support different interests, abilities, and styles of play:

• Imaginative play: Reading boats, fort-building areas, and spaces for creative storytelling
• Sensory exploration: A nature kitchen and hands-on activities that invite children to experiment with materials
• Loose parts play: Flexible materials and spaces that allow students to build, invent, and collaborate
• Social gathering: Small-group areas for conversation, friendship, and cooperative play
• Games and movement: Large-scale chess, painted games, an activity course, and other small-group activities
• Physical challenges: Climbing ropes, overhead ladders, boulders, and the ship-themed play structure

Together, these spaces encourage children to choose how they play, supporting creativity, independence, and meaningful social interactions.

A Campus Designed for Different Kinds of Play

An important challenge was creating new play opportunities without eliminating the sports facilities that remained valuable to the school.

LLD’s master plan organized the playground to accommodate both new nature-based play spaces and existing athletic activities, including a running track, soccer, kickball, and a covered basketball court.

The design also addressed stormwater management and water infiltration as part of the broader landscape improvements.

By thoughtfully organizing active, imaginative, and social play zones, the playground provides a more diverse outdoor environment while maintaining the flexibility needed for daily school operations.

A Playground That Reflects Villa Academy’s Identity

The completed playground brings together the school’s Voyager identity, its inquiry-based educational philosophy, and its commitment to community.

Children can climb aboard a ship, navigate natural play islands, build forts, explore sensory materials, participate in games, or simply gather with friends. These experiences provide opportunities for creativity, exploration, collaboration, and child-directed learning.

The project demonstrates how thoughtful private school playground design can create an outdoor environment that is both memorable and educationally meaningful.

Project Details

Client: Villa Academy

Location: Seattle, Washington

Project Type: Natural Playground and Elementary Schoolyard Design

Learning Landscapes Design Services:

• School leadership and teacher engagement
• Playground programming and concept design with cost estimate
• Natural playground and themed play integration
• Construction documents for playground with integration of stormwater management considerations
• Construction Support

Project Team:

• Villa Academy school leadership
• Learning Landscapes Design
• Stormwater Solutions Engineering
• Sundstrom Construction