South Bristol's first ever adventure playground has opened its doors today - and bosses have ambitious plans for the space.
Spread across half a hectare, Teyfant Road Adventure Playground or ‘The Hideout’ as it's been crowned by the children, offers kids a fun and beautiful place to play.
Bosses also hope the venue, which is the first adventure playground to open in Bristol in 20 years, will go some way towards tackling the city's 'holiday hunger' - where parents struggle to fill the gap left by the loss of free school meals.
To help those on the breadline, workers at The Hideout will be giving out meals to youngsters.
Learning Partnership West (LPW) has teamed up with Feeding Bristol to fund the pioneering scheme which aims to cater for hundreds of hungry children over the next few weeks.
Michelin Star chef Josh Eggleton, who runs Bristol's acclaimed Pony and Trap, was at today's launch event in Hartcliffe to hand out meals.
He said: “Feeding Bristol strives for ‘Zero Hunger’ in Bristol. Working with LPW they are helping to ensure that vulnerable people don’t go without food. I’m really pleased to have been invited to cook for the community and I hope, in doing so, I might be able to inspire a few budding chefs!”
“I hope that Bristol responds to this and helps LPW to continue to make the adventure playground even better than it already is”
Although The Hideout's doors have now opened, there's still a long way to go for the park.
At the moment it currently lacks any play equipment so bosses have launched a bid to raise £50,000 by the end of the year.
LPW CEO, Rachel Robinson said: “It is a safe, supportive environment which creates opportunities for children and young people to play. And, through play, children and young people improve their cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being. It helps them build social connections, learn life skills, improve confidence, self-esteem, resilience and enables them to learn about the world and themselves.
“The Hideout’ is an important source of free snacks and meals, which becomes even more critical during the school holidays. Thanks to Feeding Bristol, in partnership with FareShare South West, they have helped make sure we have a more substantial amount of food available at our holiday sessions and a lovely community day where we are also celebrating the opening of our adventure playground.
“We worked hard to get the playground up and running for this summer. Our doors are now open for play but we still have lots more to do including building more play structures.
"Our aim is to raise £50,000 by the end of the year to make ‘The Hideout’ an amazing, imaginative and fun place to play, learn and develop, and of course, somewhere where food and refreshments are always available” ends Rachel.
Andy Street, Chair of Feeding Bristol notes: “Feeding Bristol is committed to driving systemic change to increase food security across all social and cultural communities of Bristol.
"We want to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of immediate provision for those in need, and drive long-term local economic and national policy changes that aim to improve the food security of all Bristolians. We were very pleased to work with LPW in reaching families in south Bristol through their adventure playground.”
