On the 4^th March 1946, Lady Allen of Hurtwood was travelling to Norway for a British Council funded lecture tour. The plane she was travelling in stopped off at Copenhagen for refuelling. She was met by Jens Sigsgaard (the then Director of the Froebel Training College in Denmark) who took Lady Allen to see a playground on a new housing estate in Emdrup, Copenhagen. As Lady Allen of Hurtwood described:

“I was completely swept off my feet by my first visit to the Emdrup playground. In a flash of understanding I realized that I was looking at something quite new and full of possibilities. There was a wealth of waste material on it, and no man-made fixtures. The children could dig, build houses, experiment with sand, water or fire and play games of adventure and make-believe.”

Soon after, Lady Allen wrote up her impressions of Emdrup and submitted this to Tom Hopkinson, Editor at the Picture Post. Her article was accepted and published in November 1946. From the reaction to her Picture Post article, an experimental junk playground was started in Camberwell, London. This experimental junk playground ran for three years between 1948 and 1951.

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