FORT Review

My honest opinion of FORT

Lets start with an introduction for anyone who has not seen or heard about the FORT yet. You may or may not know how the foam play couch market is booming right now. If you do not know this, I don’t know how you missed it because it is a huge topic on social media. Nugget, a foam play couch gained mega popularity and soon very similar products were popping up like microwaveable popcorn. Then entered FORT onto the scene. But FORT has some major differences that none of the competition has. These differences include a big variety of shapes, magnets on the edges, and faux leather material.

FORT is currently on kick starter, but we were lucky enough to receive one. I know everyone who backed the kick starter is anxiously awaiting the arrival of their FORT and the people that have not backed it yet have lots of questions and curiosities. I have gotten a lot of questions on social media from people asking if they should buy the FORT and how many or if they should get a nugget or another foam couch instead of a second or even first FORT. I can not make that decision for you or even tell you what to do, because I feel like all kids and families will use all these products a little different then others. Although, I won’t tell you specifically what to buy hopefully you will leave this review with more clarity to make your decision.

So lets get to the details. The FORT overall is large. There are a lot of pieces and I find myself having pieces left over at the end of a build. The fabric is amazing, this FORT had been used by some testers and came to me with some red juice like stuff splattered on it. I was a little concerned at first, but I grabbed target brand UP AND UP wipes and the red juice like spill wiped completely off and the FORT was good as new. The fabric will be a huge plus for anyone concerned about spills and messes.

My son has loved the different forts and houses we have built (scroll down and see if you can spot our version of The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse). By far my favorite thing about the FORT besides it being magnetic, is the arches. I love having a circle that my son can climb through. Although it is my favorite part of the product, it is also the least sturdy piece. I believe there is no way around it being seemingly less sturdy then the other pieces because its an arch shape. I expected it and its very normal to me. I do not believe there is a way to change that. What I am trying to say is, it is indeed not a design flaw. I am telling you this not because I feel there is anything wrong or negative about it, but so you know what to expect. Think of it like magnetic tiles, would you expect the most curved pieces to stand up with no support? If you do not have another foam climber or magnetic tiles then it might not be something you would expect or think about.

I do not think I could say enough good things about the overall design of the FORT. The different shapes and pieces leave so much room for creativity. I love that my son can pick the pieces up and build on his own. I am not sure how the owner, Conor came up with the concept but it is amazing. My son has had a blast building houses, climbing on top, and then knocking it down. Since I mentioned knocking it down let me just say my son LOVES knocking the FORT down. I think the combination of karate chopping in between all the magnets and the way all the pieces fall to make a perfect fun pile of shapes to climb over and jump on make the FORT by far the most fun item in our playroom to knock down. The FORT has been more fun to knock down then even our biggest wooden block set or magnetic tiles. If you have a mini destroyer you know exactly what I am talking about.

I have successfully made a few different climbers that my son can climb on the top of with just 1 FORT but if you are really interested in taller builds I definitely recommend getting more than one FORT. But rest assured caregivers, there is absolutely enough pieces to build a huge variety of builds with just one FORT. You could easily make a rocket, plane, house, cave, ball pit, couch, different shapes, climbers, tall towers with just one FORT. You can still build and do so many things with one.

My sons favorite piece of the fort is definitely the half circles. I am not sure why, but he calls them his seats. He loves stepping and sitting on them and has already came up with his own fun ideas for them. Yesterday he wanted to play bakery and he used the half circles as a seat and used nugget triangles with a rectangle from the FORT across the triangles as his table.

I will say I have seen and gotten a lot of requests to compare the FORT to the nugget. I did some builds with both and although I feel like they were a great compliment with one another it does not seem logical to me to compare the two because they are very different. I knew when I saw the FORT that it brought something to the table that nugget did not and that was shapes and magnets. I would not have supported this company so strongly or even been interested in getting the product if it was comparable to the nugget because we already have 5 nuggets. I would not have spent my money on a product like the nugget when we already own nuggets. To me if nugget and magnetic tiles had a baby that would be FORT. The magnetic corners and different shapes of FORT similar to magnetic tiles and the life size foam pieces similar to the nugget make FORT a super unique and open ended toy that will create fun and entertainment for my son for years to come.

The FORT is an awesome product that brings a fresh new twist to the common foam play couch. There is nothing else that I have found on the market quite like FORT. We have had a blast with the FORT. If you want your kids to be up moving, building, creating then absolutely get the FORT.