Building the Boundary: Prison Renovation, Porosity and Carceral Borders
Prisons are often imagined as bounded institutions, clearly separated from wider society by walls, gates and security regimes. Drawing on a unique archive of refurbishment logbooks from HMP Liverpool, in this presentation I examine a 1980s renovation of a wing within this operational prison, as part of a national programme of modernisation of the UK’s 19th century prison estate through the introduction of in-cell sanitation. Although emptied of prisoners, the wing remained inside the secure perimeter, creating new encounters between prison staff, prisoners, contractors, vehicles, materials and infrastructures.
I argue that the refurbishment generated a liminal space, simultaneously both prison and construction site. Analysis reveals the extensive labour required to attain separation, including access controls, escort arrangements and restrictions on communication. Yet the logbooks also reveal the persistent porosity of these arrangements, as conversations, local social connections, dust, noise, water, pests and disruptions repeatedly traversed institutional boundaries.
In the paper I shift attention from prison boundaries as fixed architectural features to the everyday practices through which distinctions are produced and maintained. At a moment when the 19th century prison estate was itself characterised as transitioning to 20th century standards, I demonstrate how moments of architectural transformation expose the contingent, relational and unfinished character of carceral space.