Jennifer Turner - Turning over a new leaf: The health-enabling capacities of green space in prison

When we think about prisons, we are unlikely to consider them as being healthy or therapeutic spaces. More than this, we might consider that prisons should be exactly the opposite of this to act as a deterrent for crime. Indeed, much literature in this area places strong focus upon the ‘pains’ or adverse effects of imprisonment. Instead, this lecture draws on notions of therapeutic landscapes to consider spaces of incarceration alongside other ‘health-enabling’ environments that deploy architectural management and aesthetic considerations for the purported benefit of those that are housed within them. This lecture takes examples from recently-built prisons in the UK and Scandinavia to explore the responses to ‘green spaces’ in the custodial setting. Although horticulture and green-landscaping are rarely prioritised in the cost-driven and risk-adverse context of the UK, green space is paramount in the custodial counterparts in other countries around the world. In attending to these distinct architectures, this lecture theorises the prison as a nurturing rather than punitive environment, where the inclusion of green spaces arguably harnesses a potential to rehabilitate offending individuals.