THE PARTNERS

Odyssea is an award-winning nonprofit organization in Greece that supports young vulnerable people to have access to employment opportunities in society. We partnered with Odyssea to prototype an open source STEM product, made by refugee youth for refugee children in Greece. 

THE CHALLENGE

Children who have experienced trauma lack access to meaningful play and are at the risk of developmental delays: indeed, playing is not just fun, it is the fuel for socio-emotional and cognitive skill-building. Young adults also lack opportunities to learn relevant market-skills, and unemployment for displaced youth is dangerously high as well as highly dangerous for their future. In addition, NGO programs often rely on international assets and are difficult to scale. The challenge is evident: there are too few programs for young children made for refugees, by refugees. 

How might we create pop-up play spaces made by refugees for refugees?

THE BIG IDEA

Train and support refugee youth to manufacture pop-up play space for refugee children by using the open source building shapes Follies.

THE DESIGN PROCESS

STEP 1: Design and test the product with children. 

Following extensive research and play-testing sessions, Follies was designed with children from the USA, their families, and with children from Syria and Afghanistan who have been displaced in Greek refugee camps. Several product prototypes were created before landing on a product that met all the fun and quality criteria.

STEP 2: Release the Follies product with an open source license 

In 2021 Follies was released as a commercial product and shortly became nominated for a Toy of The Year Award. A first for a commercial product, Follies released its main design as an open source hardware element under a Creative Commons License, that anyone in the world can use to create a custom pop-up play space with the use of simple woodworking tools.

STEP 3: Partner with Odyssea to engage refugee youth

Our partner Odyssea was the first organization to take the open source design of Follies, and adapt it to their available design materials and resources in their local communities. They provided relevant training to displaced young adults, and supported them as they built their own version of Follies. The toy was then distributed to children in the refugee camp of Elaionas for children to create their own play-space.

THE OUTCOME

Here is what the families said at Eleonas Camp:

“The space and the timing is never ideal in the camp and kids have so many issues and traumas. Your workshop was an opportunity to co-create without explanations and rules and that meant freedom and creativity for the entire team.”

“This was a much quieter and easy day for us. The children played and were focused much more than usual. You could see they had fun and we could communicate with them despite language barriers. This was fun for us as well.”