Changes in Children’s Spaces: The History of Playgrounds and Fairytale Connections in Hungary during the Socialist Period

My study outlines the history of the development of the typical settings of socialist architecture—the housing estates, panel blocks, and socialist modernist playgrounds—in parallel with the evolution of the status of the fairytale in socialism. The run-down spaces and abandoned milieus of the socialist period, born as spaces shaped by an ideal system and as visions of the new city and society, seem even sadder today. Through metaphorical architectural spaces, the utopia that once shone like a bright star is contrasted with what is sometimes nostalgia and sometimes a new beginning, a tabula rasa. My writing traces the history of the development and perception of socialist housing estates and the associated playgrounds/communal spaces, and explores how children’s needs, fairytales, and fantasies increasingly shape these spaces as the regime changes.