Archinect - News

The debate around prison reuse swells as reform measures continue to decrease incarceration rates dramatically

2021-11-11T12:51:00-05:00

Some prisons have been successfully transformed into whiskey distilleries, youth hostels, museums and boutique hotels. Others have been demolished, sometimes over the objections of local preservationists. But there’s a third option: Carceral sites can be reoriented as places that actively work to undo the damage wrought by mass incarceration.

The movement to design spaces that are actively working to undo some of the social harms caused by mass incarceration is still fairly nascent, with salient projects in Atlanta and other places serving as models that can be applied in the age of bail reform, alternative sentencing, and other measures that have reduced the overall prison population by up to 42% in certain states.

“Our view is that more architects should instead help those who are formerly incarcerated so they don’t go back to prison, and to support populations who are targeted and at high-risk for incarceration,” DJDS founder Deanna van Buren told Archinect’s Antonio Pacheco in a 2019 interview. The impetus should be shifted even further towards designing spaces that alleviate the sources of crime in the mold of DJDS. As Thoreau said: “There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.”

Deanna Van Buren on designing beyond incarceration

2020-03-10T18:58:00-04:00

Van Buren’s most ambitious undertaking so far is the reimagining of a hulking 471,000 square foot Detention Center in downtown Atlanta. [...] Van Buren has been working with social justice organizations and a mayoral task force to transform the site into an “Equity Center” that will incorporate financial literacy, job training, access to legal services and other community needs.

Writing in The New York Times, journalist Patricia Leigh Brown profiles Deanna Van Buren, co-founder of Designing Justice + Designing Spaces (DJDS), an Oakland, California-based architecture and real estate development non-profit that is working to end mass incarceration.

Archinect profiled the work and practice of DJDS in a Studio Snapshot last year. In that interview, Van Buren explained the nature of her practice: "Our office is rooted in creative strategies that are empathic and always include deep listening to those most impacted by the problems we are seeking to solve. We are in service to those who have had no voice in the built environment. We are a relatively new practice so the thesis hasn’t changed much, but has certainly become more refined."

NYC issues RFQ for new municipal jail towers

2020-02-05T13:47:00-05:00

The New York City Department of Design and Construction (DDC) has issued a Request for Qualifications soliciting design-build teams that will create the city's $8 billion plan to create four new "Borough-Based Jails" tower complexes.

According to a press release, the project will bring into being four new jail facilities in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx. These facilities will be designed to house 3,000 people. The jail tower projects represent the city's attempt to reposition its carceral system as the Rikers Island complex begins to close down.

Previously on Archinect: AECOM to build Rikers Island replacement facilities across New York's boroughs. Aerial photo of Rikers Island in New York City, Photo courtesy U.S. Geological Survey.

According to the press release, DDC is asking firms to submit a Statement of Qualifications (SOQ) in response to the RFQ that will be used to create a short-list of firms that will then be asked to respond to a Request for Proposals (RFQ)....

San Francisco could close its youth jail

2019-06-07T15:02:00-04:00

A vote this week by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors has put the city on a path to virtually end youth incarceration, the first major city in the United States to do so.

Following an 18-month study guided by formerly-incarcerated teens, city officials have agreed to a plan that will close San Francisco's Youth Guidance Center juvenile jail by the end of 2021.

The move will make San Francisco the first large city to eliminate its youth incarceration program.

The measure, approved this week with a 10-1 vote by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, will not only close the city's juvenile hall, but will also end the practice of incarcerating arrested teens while they await trial. The initiative also spurs city officials to work with community members to develop alternative forms of rehabilitation for teens convicted of crimes, and will create a Youth Justice Reinvestment Fund to fuel those efforts. The restorative justice-focused fund will be sustained by the money saved from closing the jails and will help provide employment, affordable housing, and other services.

San Francisco currently spends $13 million per year to operate the jail, which, acco...

Learning from Rikers Island: the future of carceral infrastructure in New York City

2017-12-08T13:36:00-05:00

Mayor de Blasio’s recent pledge to close the Rikers Island jail complex within ten years was met with celebration by many — and skepticism by others. After 85 years in the public imagination, it has become hard to believe that the East River behemoth could ever really be slain. But the reality of a post-Rikers future is coming into focus [...]. Rikers is toxic, and its era is done. A change is on the wind, it seems, and the island’s aura of inevitability is finally dispersing.

In their Urban Omnibus essay, "A Jail to End All Jails," authors Jarrod Shanahan and Jack Norton take a closer look at the history and a potential future of one of the nation's most notorious prisons and the greater jail infrastructure of a city where the average daily incarcerated population was at 9,400 in 2017.

"Following the recommendation of the Lippman Commission in calling for a system of local jails to replace the central complex, de Blasio has released a plan for Rikers’ closure and sought support from consultants and City Council members in siting new jails or expanding existing borough facilities to accommodate more prisoners. The logic goes that jails in the boroughs will be closer to courts, helping cases move through the system more efficiently, and closer to the support of family and social services, helping prisoners stay out of the system once released."

Why the design of prisons matters

2016-09-28T17:22:00-04:00

the world’s prisons are home to an estimated 10 million people globally and this number is rising. The world’s prison population has gone up 10% since 2004, and in some countries, such as Indonesia, the increase has been as high as 183% [...] Architecture sends a silent message to everyone walking into any place. It tells you what to expect and where the limits of behaviour are. Prisons are the same.

In my view, design is crucial to creating an environment in which prisoners can live and not become institutionalised. This means providing spaces for staying in contact with families, work, education, and playing sport.

For more on carceral architectures, follow these links:

Raphael Sperry, President of Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility, on the "hauntingly real" computer game, "Prison Architect"

2015-11-11T12:45:00-05:00

space and building costs are just as much of guiding principles in designing real prisons as they are in Prison Architect. [...] "Prisoners themselves are generally not included in the conversation where the prison construction budget is allocated to different priorities, so their needs come last and cell size is generally set at the legal minimum," Sperry said. "The legal standard only bars 'cruel or unusual punishment'—a cell can be punitively small as long as it doesn't cross that limit."

More on the discussion around prison architecture:

Architecture of correction: Rikers Island

2015-07-08T18:00:00-04:00

As long as the City of New York has owned Rikers Island, since the 1880s, it has been a place for the unwanted. For a time, pigs were raised for slaughter there. [...] was converted to a partial landfill, full of horse manure and garbage. The odor repelled its neighbors in the boroughs, and the refuse attracted a sizable rat population, which the city tried to contain by releasing wild dogs. [...] It took poison gas to kill off the rodents. Next the city moved humans to Rikers.

The NYT on prison architecture and ethics

2015-02-17T13:34:00-05:00

Faced with lawsuits and a growing mountain of damning research, New York City officials decided last month to ban solitary confinement for prison inmates 21 and younger. Just a few weeks earlier, the American Institute of Architects rejected a petition to censure members who design solitary-confinement cells and death chambers. [...] What are the ethical boundaries for architecture?

Previously: