There hasn’t been a project for a new prison in Bulgaria for the last 50 years, and the crime rates are going up. Main problem is our capital Sofia. The only state prison is the Sofia Central Prison. Build in the 1900 its capacity is 250 souls, now it houses 2000 people. The space is limited, the conditions are far from the one preserving the human rights. Moreover the building is announced to be an object of cultural preservation and should not house this function anymore.
A prison is a place where people that break the law are locked up as a punishment for their crimes. Prisons have different characteristic in different cultures, there are places of punishment and isolation and there are places for treatment and rehabilitation, there are even places of repression and symbols of terror.
Prisons are in a way a social phenomena. They form environment which is far away from our believes and understandings. But most importantly they form a society, existing as a subformation of our own.
Winston Churchill said ‘First we shape our buildings, than they shape us’. That appear to be so right about prison typology and development.
Winston Churchill said ‘First we shape our buildings, than they shape us’. That appear to be so right about prison typology and development.
Most prisons are one to three stories high, others are under the ground, but no typology suggests a prison above ground. My concept leans upon that idea, of designing a prison that will make escape impossible and by separating a convict from the ground will make him think and pay for the sins and crimes he did. The higher you go, the smaller the cells, the tougher the stay.
All that should make you think that ‘CRIME DOES NOT PAY’.
The barrier between the prisoner and the ground is invisible, psychological, mental, but as strong and tangible as a 2m thick concrete WALL.
