In 2015, they brought The Beach to Washington, D.C. In 2018, they built a Fun House. This summer, designers Alex Mustonen and Daniel Arsham of Snarkitecture have returned to the National Building Museum’s Great Hall with another immersive environment: THE PLAYGROUND.
The museum selected Snarkitecture to design its summer 2026 installation in May. ZGF is the architect of record, with Grace Cabrera, John Barbara and Tim Williams on its team.
With THE PLAYGROUND, Snarkitecture has brought public infrastructure typically found outdoors inside the walls of the museum to create a series of environments that explore the mental and physical benefits of play and how Americans have played over time.
Across nine distinct activation areas, the installation applies principles of landscape architecture and highlights construction materials and methods, turning plywood and scaffolding into design objects.
Founded in 2008, Snarkitecture is known for taking a playful approach to its projects and creating interactive environments that blur the lines between art and architecture. Its name comes from “The Hunting of the Snark (An Agony in Eight Fits),” a nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll that humorously recounts “the impossible voyage of an improbable crew to find an inconceivable creature.”
Reimagining everyday materials and spaces, Snarkitecture’s work emphasizes participation, perception, and the transformation of the ordinary into the extraordinary. Past projects include retail environments for Pharrell Williams and Nigo’s Billionaire Boys Club, a restaurant and gallery in Tokyo, a nightclub in Bangkok, and a memorial to the Orange Bowl Stadium in Miami.
For its first installation in the National Building Museum’s Great Hall, The Beach, Snarkitecture transformed the space into a “shoreline” with beach chairs and umbrellas and an “ocean” of nearly one million translucent plastic balls where visitors could splash around.
For Fun House, the studio created a freestanding house with rooms showcasing a retrospective of its past projects, objects and environments, including Dig, Drift, Playhouse and Light Cavern. In the back was a kidney-shaped swimming pool filled with the same plastic balls used in The Beach’s ball pit.
The National Building Museum is housed inside the former U.S. Pension Bureau headquarters, designed by Montgomery Meigs. Past designers and architecture firms commissioned for the summer installations there include Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG Maze); James Corner Field Operations (ICEBERGS); and Studio Gang (Hive). Only Snarkitecture has been featured three times.
“Each summer we invite a designer to reimagine the Great Hall in a way that changes how people experience space,” said museum president and executive director Aileen Fuchs. “Snarkitecture has a unique ability to transform familiar materials into something surprising and participatory, and their past installations have created some of the most memorable experiences in the museum’s history.”
As an installation, THE PLAYGROUND is closer to Fun House than The Beach, because it offers multiple experiences, whereas The Beach was more of a one-liner.
Some of the play zones have names, including the Dig Pit (a sandbox-type area with granulated cork instead of sand and shovels and buckets provided); the Adventure Yard (a mini-construction precinct); the Climbing Wall and the Sport Court (featuring three basketball hoops and orange sponge balls.) Other zones include a maze, a seating plateau with intermittent sliding boards, and a lounge containing hammocks and “spinning chairs.” About all that’s missing is a trampoline.
One of the more challenging zones could be right out of “Survivor,” with rope netting that kids have to wriggle through, stepping stones to hop across, and a squiggly, narrow balance beam. It draws long lines of kids eager to test their motor skills.
While the museum says THE PLAYGROUND is for all ages, different play zones are recommended for kids of different ages. One end is geared for the youngest kids just learning about color, form, and space; while the Sport Court and Climbing Wall on the other end are intended for older kids, perhaps budding athletes. The Sport Court doubles as a space where an adult leads kids in calisthenics and dance exercises, among other activities. And everything’s in a climate-controlled setting that’s 10 to 20 degrees cooler than it is outside.
Sustainability is a big part of the design. The Dig Pit’s granulated cork comes from nearby Maryland. The museum says it intends to repurpose or recycle as many of the elements used to build the exhibits as possible at the end of the installation.
What Snarkitecture has created is the ultimate playground for learning, and the lessons aren’t just for children. As the designers state in the exhibit: “THE PLAYGROUND invites people of all ages to discover the joy, wonder and creativity of imaginative, open-ended play.”
The Playground is on view in the National Building Museum through August 30.