“I live in a really old house. It’s 40 years old!” comments on her life in Lviv Ivanka, one of the quest developers. The girl from Kharkiv moved to the neighborhood of Naukova Street after the full-scale invasion began. Indeed, compared to her age, this house is very old, as it is four times older than she is. Thus, collecting unusual views of familiar places, the MuMi team continued the project to create subjective children’s maps.
Over 1,000 children and adults have already participated in the previous quest through the city downtown. This time, the map and the quest are created by the residents of Naukova Street.
Why did we choose the area of Naukova Street?
What would you show your friend who came to Lviv? The Opera House, the monuments, the University, Rynok Square? These are the locations that most city residents will probably name. The so-called ” residential” and “industrial” districts are rarely perceived as places where something interesting can be discovered.
The territory around Naukova Street was developed in the 1970s as a neighborhood for employees of local enterprises. But even in such a seemingly utilitarian space, you can find your own special and fascinating sites.
It was interesting for us to explore Naukova from the kids’ perspective, as they do not follow the criteria of adults in choosing the most interesting places in the neighborhood. Children are equally interested in running up and down the hills left by the construction and examining the mosaics and drawings on the walls of the apartment blocks.
In the streets of the residential areas where the project participants grew up, there are not only typical panel buildings, but also many spots that children want to share with their friends: secret lawns in the park, cats near the supermarket, slides on Sonyachna Street and a house with porthole windows. The map and the quest will help residents to explore their neighborhood from a new angle, and guests to take an interesting trip and discover the city from a different perspective.
What do you need to know about creating a map and a quest?
Traditionally, the City Museum team invited experts and prepared a series of lectures, workshops, and excursions for children. The meetings were held in the Multiplex media library, from where the developers went on walks around the district. This time, the development team consisted of 8 children aged 8-14 who joined the project through open registration.
In addition to learning about history, urban planning, and architecture, the participants had the opportunity to observe the city, notice important details or even inconveniences that need to be fixed. Kharkiv architect Kateryna Herasechkina explored the topic of city orientation with the participants, talked about the peculiarities of collecting personal stories with researcher Iryna Sklokina from the Centre for Urban History, and during the workshop, Anastasia Hornichar and the participants made models of famous buildings in the district, such as the New TSUM (Department Store) and the Suputnik Hotel.
The children who developed the map and the quest balanced their own experience with the experience of their peers, potential travelers to the new neighborhood. For example, they had to test the parapet on Volodymyra Velykoho Street and a chicken-shaped swing on one of the playgrounds together.
Why is this quest unusual?
Although this is the second quest by MuMi, the project team has figured out how to make it equally interesting and add new elements to the game. In this quest, we have created a decoder puzzle game and offer to solve a quote belonging to a famous writer. To find all the words of the quote, you need to guess the locations, go to the most interesting places in the neighborhood and complete the tasks. Another innovation is that each team will decide where to start the quest and create its own route. The map and all the necessary elements for the quest will be available in the traveler’s kit.
The participants will receive an original prize for completing the quest, which can be chosen from three options.
How and where to complete the quest around Naukova Street?
The traveler’s kit can be borrowed from the Tourist Information Centre and eight libraries in different districts of the city.
You can register for the quest and learn about the terms of participation here.
We remind you that you can also complete another quest in the central part of Lviv. Find the details here.
The subjective children’s map and the quest were developed as part of the project “Creating children’s maps of Lviv districts. Naukova” jointly by the staff of the City Museum, the Foundation for the Development of the City Museum in Lviv, and the Levy team – Maksym Oliinyk, Nastia Brezmen, Marichka Lanova, Mariia and Ivanka Ivashchenko, Oleh Polevskyi, Yura Kovalchuk, and Nazar Hrynchyshyn. The project is supported by the ZMIN Foundation.
