Tenn Little Birds day-care seeks a secure and stimulating environment that fosters music creation and sensory engagement.
Tenn Little Birds emphasizes music-making and the importance of music in the lives of children. Yet, their outside waiting area didn’t match the interior’s theme of musical enrichment, so we designed a music-themed sensory wall with matching environmental designs.
They’re also located down an alley, which isn’t the most inviting or easy-to-navigate space. We enhanced their signage for a better wayfinding experience that was clear and inviting.
Because the clients of TLB often have to wait for their children outside, or in a small waiting room, we identified that the space could benefit by bringing the enrichment found inside, to the outside.
During play experiences, combining the sense of touch with the senses of vision, hearing, taste and smell helps build cognitive skills.
Activating these senses, and providing kids a variety of ways to manipulate objects, caters to good development of psychomotor foundations.
After visiting the location, we started sketching possible solutions to create an engaging and aesthetic space. Ideas Included:
In the end, we decided to exclude the sensory garden walkway due to complexity and time constraints.
We upgraded the small paper sign of the address to large panels of painted wood, with colorful and legible text that would stand out from afar.
Although the initial design began with blue, we opted for a white background, prompting a switch from yellow text to blue to enhance contrast.
We also hand-painted their logo on a wooden board to replace their printed banner, and give the entrance a more homey feel.
Birdhouse faces were placed between two-foot tall music notes to address the bare fence, and support the themes of music and nature.
We initially designed multiple low-fidelity renders of music pallets, which were later refined to two final designs. The location of the wall was chosen so the kids could have fun in a space that wouldn’t disrupt class inside, hence the back corner area.
We opted for everyday materials, such as baking sheets and paint tins, to encourage sustainability & that music can be made anywhere, anytime.
You may have noticed our team is larger on this project. In order for a larger-scale physical design project to meet deadline expectations, a lot of hands are required. This can sometimes complicate things, but thankfully, we had a lovely team of co-designers on hand. This allowed for the physicality of the project to be fun, instead of daunting!
