Bringing inclusive play to the Vivid Sydney festival

Inclusion is a theme that cuts across all of our community focus areas of health and wellbeing, community connection and access to lifelong education opportunities. With one in five Australians living with a disability, the Stockland CARE Foundation was delighted to collaborate with Vivid Sydney organisers, Destination NSW, Cushman & Wakefield, Charter Hall, ARA Group, Westpac and Australia Post to make inclusion a focus of the annual Vivid Sydney festival in 2018.

The outcome was the festival’s first inclusive playspace at Tumbalong Lights, setting a new benchmark for inclusive, imaginative outdoor play. This fantastic play installation showcased how all children can play together, including those with physical disabilities, vision, hearing and mobility impairments, or spectrum disorders such as autism.

Over 23 evenings, over 60,000 visitors enjoyed Tumbalong Lights. Of these visitors, 700 groups were identified as having special needs or access requirements.

The work of Tumbalong Lights is an extension of our focus on inclusion in the communities where we operate. In collaboration with Stockland CARE Foundation partner Touched by Olivia, we have developed 11 inclusive play spaces around the country in both our retail town centres and residential communities with our partner. We remain focused on developing more inclusive playgrounds to make a lasting, positive contribution to local communities.