A year in reflection
When we began, Pok Pok was just a few of us. A tiny team of really passionate individuals determined to reinvent the way kids play and learn using technology. Today, our team is actually still pretty small, but we now have the power of thousands of families who play with Pok Pok Playroom in our corner, inspiring everything we make for kids.
2021 has been a very wild year for pretty much everyone, and for us it was especially huge. Here are a few of our favourite moments!
On May 20th, 2021 we launched Pok Pok Playroom on the App Store. It was a day we’ll never forget, and we talked a lot about what it meant to us in this launch day blog if you want a refresher. It’s all still true!
Only three weeks after it’s release, Pok Pok Playroom won an Apple Design Award! Being recognized for excellence in design from people who we consider to be some of the world’s best designers is an accomplishment we’ll cherish forever. Even Esther and Mathijs’ kids were excited!
In June we released our first big update — House! It’s come to be one of the most popular toys in the Playroom, and we attribute that to one thing: children’s imaginations. House is a toy that gives kids the ultimate creative freedom to build worlds, characters, circumstances and solutions. Seeing them in action is magic.
In the following months we welcomed a huge update to Silly Blocks and Busy Board, as well as added Forest, the first Pok Pok toy that uses artificial intelligence to spark creative thinking.
We also continued working with some incredible advisors who supported us in designing and finessing every single detail in Pok Pok Playroom, including Paediatric Occupational Therapist Laura Petix, Neuroscientist Dr. Cindy Hovington, Creativity Researcher and Scholar Dr. Michael DeSchryver, Kindergarten Teacher Stephanie Phoenix, and so many more. Thank you all for your inspiration, education and trust.
Fall surprised us with an Academics’ Choice Smart Media Award and a Parent Tested, Parent Approved Award! These two are particularly special because they come from an esteemed council of educators and YOU — real parents. We are so touched to be recognized by our mentors, peers and parents in our community. Thank you for your support!
As 2021 began to wind down, we sped up! In November were thrilled to release Blocks, our homage to one of our favorite evergreen toys. In December we updated Town with the biggest, most robust update of the year. We collaborated with New York City Urban Planner Sarah Kaufman to design an environmentally friendly, urban expansion to our existing Town, making it the most complex, exploratory toy in the Playroom. It features hundreds of new features and hidden surprises which we expect kids are still uncovering!
Everything on this list has been truly wonderful, but the most special and important part of 2021 came from you — our community. Hearing from you and your kids continues to provide us with the inspiration and motivation to keep inspiring creativity, imagination and learning in ways that have never been done before on devices (spoiler alert — 2022 has some seriously cool toys that started as ideas from your kids). Thank you for all of your reviews, videos and feedback this year!
We look forward to an exceptional 2022, one where we promise to continue pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with digital play.
We hope you’ll stay with us on our journey as we continue to create creative learning experiences that your kids can carry with them through life, and do our part to help raise the next generation of creative thinkers.
Stay tuned on social media @playpokpok for some really exciting news early 2022 and some big new updates coming your way in just a few weeks.
Here’s to a new year of play!
Thank you and Happy New Year,
Esther & Melissa
