Benches for the Patio

About This Project

Tracing Spaces at the José Rafael Pérez Valdiviezo High School, aimed to teach participatory design tools to transform the courtyard of the institution. The Tracing Spaces team traveled to the town of El Rincón to work with 9th-grade students of the school with the San José Foundation team as a local ally.

In this program, we invited young people to transform the beautiful garden inside their school into a space for recreation, a pleasant and shady place where they could sit down to talk with their classmates, eat their snacks or just spend the break. This was achieved by building a series of benches made from recycled pallet wood.

More than 50 students participated in the activity. Divided into groups, they first made a schematic model of where the benches were to be placed strategically in the yard. Then they went on to build the 3 types of proposed benches. Participants learned about recycling and proportions, as well as using construction tools: tape measure, conveyor, level, sandpaper, paintbrush, hammer and saw.

Working with young people and the educational community in bench building, we discovered many skills that for some were unfamiliar, such as leadership, teamwork, hand skills, space and math skills, carpentry and design. Thanks to the realization of the benches, the young people managed to create this new space of entertainment for the entire educational community.