The Regnlekplatsen, or “rain playground”, is part of Rain Gothenburg, a bold plan to be “the best city in the world when it’s raining”.

“The tourist agency has only wanted to sell pictures of a sunny Gothenburg, even though it rains here nearly 40% of the time,” explains Jens Thoms Ivarsson, the artist and designer hired more than three years ago to develop the project. “What we’re looking at is: how can we use the fact that it rains quite a lot in Gothenburg in a creative way? What if we can turn the rain into an asset for the city?”

Since he was employed full-time at the city’s water and waste disposal department, Thoms Ivarsson has launched an annual competition to have poems cast on to manhole covers, helped set up two rain playgrounds, and launched several art and dance projects – including one where polar bear footprints have been painted across the city’s Esperantoplatsen square using special paint so that they only appear when it is raining...

The Guardian. Wetter the better: Gothenburg’s bold plan to be world’s best rainy city