PLAY AT YOUR OWN RISK: Hanegi Play Park is the playground health and safety forgot. Photo / Supplied
It's been dubbed the "land that health and safety forgot" as this Japanese children's park encourages young visitors to play with knives and light fires.
Tokyo's Hanegi Play Park operates on the philosophy that children flourish and develop better when not mollycoddled by safety restrictions.
In order to do this they have assembled a set of toys that look more they belong more in a hardware store than a playground.
Saws, nails and hammers are all fair game.
Around the park are Japanese signs reading: "PLAY AT YOUR OWN RISK".
However, the phrase has become more of a mantra for the park than a liability disclaimer.
The wooden houses, climbing frames and slides were all built by the children, claims the park.
One suspects the structures were assembled with at least some supervision from adults. But it appears to there is no danger here of "over-parenting".
Parents see the park as a way for kids to learn and test themselves.
One mother speaking to the Sora News network was asked if the children ever get hurt?
"Of course sometimes the kids get small injuries, but that's usually a learning experience for them," is her tough-love response.
"We want people who know the purpose of letting kids play to visit our park."
Currently, Japanese society is obsessed with the notion of the Hikikomori: a generation of reclusive teens and young adults that are known as "room hermits".
In 2016 the Japanese cabinet survey recorded that there were 541,000 young people between 15 and 39 suffering from this acute social withdrawal, reported CNN.
From societal pressure to overly protective upbringings – there are a variety of vices that Japan blames for this generation who have shut themselves away, preferring to play video games in parents' basements.
The mollycoddled child and, worse still, overly-protective parent have become totems.
At Hanegi, the park appears to have veered wildly away from this mode of helicopter parenting.
However behind the chaotic appearance is some semblance of order and practical learning.
Instead, kids are given practical instructions, a chance to learn about cooking and DIY in their own way.
Knives, hammers and, yes, open fires become the tools to play at the skills that a generation of young Japanese are badly lacking.
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