Mill River Playground is the first new permanent improvement in Mill River Park. Robin Stein, Director of the Stamford Land Use Bureau recognized the development of the playground to be an opportunity for building the community of interest for Mill River Park as a whole by engaging multiple constituencies – corporate, West Side, civic, educational and government – in working together to create a playground that would be exciting and compelling for children from throughout Stamford. Prior to building the play equipment, the first improvements designed by Olin Partnership, the park’s landscape architect, were built including granite walls, steps, curbs, stone dust paths, and ramps, creating the site for the play equipment. Stamford hired Leathers & Associates, a design firm that only builds playgrounds that will be built by volunteers, to design the play equipment in collaboration with local children and lead the barn-raising type community build. Leathers met with Students from Hart Magnet and Stillmeadow elementary schools and incorporated as many of their ideas as possible into the design.

click image for larger view Photo Credits: Sue Sweeney & Jeff King

Click on the links below for picture galleries and video of the playground

The theme for the Playground’s design was the habitat of the Mill River. Anne Simmons, art teacher at Hart Magnet School organized students, teachers and parents to create five beautiful wildlife murals on 6-inch tiles that were glazed and fired at Hart. Click here for pictures of the murals.

Working with the City, Mill River Collaborative organized a Community Build Playground Committee of committed volunteers willing to take responsibility for organizing the things required for a successful community build including tools, food, volunteers, materials, services, publicity, children’s involvement and funding. During 2005 and early 2006, volunteers Linda King and Adriana Catlett recruited dozens of companies and organizations and over 1,500 people to work on the playground during the seven day community-build May 15-21, 2006. Myra Roche secured donations of enough food to feed them all three meals a day and Erin McKenna recruited contributions of loaned tools and organized and managed the tool and materials operation. Milton Puryear managed the purchase and delivery of materials and hardware funded by the City and organized publicity and funding for the project.

Other key members of the committee were Robin Stein, Steve Crews (GE), David Klaer, Kathy Walsh (Stamford Partnership). Key resource people on site during construction included Jeff Brown, Bob Huntley, Rob Burrus, Sue Sweeney. A partial list of organizations and key people who contributed during the playground’s construction can be seen here.

A number of contributors helped endow the playground, providing funding for its long-term maintenance. You can contribute to the Mill River Playground Endowment by sending your tax deductible contribution to:

Mill River Collaborative
PO Box 1401
Stamford, CT 06904-1401

The final improvements for the playground include the planting of thousands of bulbs, grasses, perennials, shrubs and trees that will give it a beautiful palette of colors and textures throughout the year. Following are links to PDFs for our planting lists and plans:

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