Recreational benches that exercise you while you rest

When you visit a playground, it is common to see children full of energy while the parents, sitting on the park benches, are torn between supervising their children and looking at their mobile devices. What many of these parents do not know is that age-related muscle loss, known as sarcopenia, begins around age 30. Muscle and strength loss is a real concern, and that is why the Belgian health insurance company Helan has introduced an innovative idea in playgrounds.

Helan has installed special benches in parks to encourage physical activity in adults. These benches are uniquely designed to address the problem of muscle loss. For example, one of these benches, balanced on a helical spring, forces people to work their core muscles to counteract the rocking movements. Two other benches require people to climb a ladder or a steep slide, and the fourth bench has short legs, which forces people to exercise their legs to stand up. These innovative benches, designed by the design studio RAAK, have been placed in a recreation area in Ghent, Belgium, and six other Belgian cities have also expressed interest in this initiative.

Parks often have outdoor gym equipment that requires a specific effort to be used. The difference with these recreational benches is that they blend perfectly into people’s daily lives, without the need for significant changes in the daily routine or dedicating additional time to exercise.

So how could your brand encourage a change in people’s behavior in their daily lives? How could you design solutions that raise awareness among people and motivate them to adopt healthy behaviors, even when they are busy or tired?

This innovative approach in public spaces demonstrates that creativity and attention to well-being can go hand in hand. In addition, these ideas could inspire new ways of addressing health and wellness problems in daily life.

This article is a machine translation of the Spanish original.

• Innovation
• Health
• Design