Advancing Corrections Journal - Edition #18 - What Is Working With Women: Correctional Practice in the Post Bangkok Rules Era (ACJ18-A003)

Article 3: Responding to the Need for a Gender Perspective in Correctional Facilities Programming and Design (ACJ18-A003)

Abstract

In the past several decades, the number of justice-involved women and gender non-conforming people has grown exponentially all over the world. Their biographies and pathways to crime differ significantly from those of cisgender men, bringing with them very distinctive needs, complex histories of trauma, and unique circumstances once incarcerated. Yet, a large proportion of women continue to be held in custodial facilities originally designed for and by men. With the growing understanding that women who offend are different from men, this article presents promising advances in the planning and architectural landscape. The desire for change and the urgent call for creating more trauma-informed and healing environments have fueled a unique opportunity to explore innovative gender-specific architectural styles and uplifting design solutions that recognize and celebrate these distinctive needs for better, more positive outcomes.

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Authors

Sarah Paddick

Senior Associate Architecture, Grieve Gillett Architects, Australia

Trained in Architecture at the University of Adelaide, Sarah was a director in her own Architecture and Interior Design practice from 1994 to 2023 when she accepted a Senior Associate role with Grieve Gillett Architects (GGA) as part of a merger. Her main area of expertise is in Secure Facility Architecture, undertaking over 100 projects in secure facilities in South Australia, and she now leads the Justice portfolio in her new position at GGA. In 2010 she undertook a worldwide tour of Women’s Secure Facilities in her role as the Catherine Helen Spence Memorial Scholar, focusing on residential parenting programs. She has worked as a consultant to the South Australian Department for Correctional Services as a design advisor on their major redevelopment programs at the Yatala Labour Prison and Adelaide Women’s Prison and was a member of the Stronger Foundations and Clear Pathways Women’s Ministerial Work Group.

Sarah is one of the founding directors of the UTurn Foundation, a not-for-profit social initiative focusing on improving outcomes for incarcerated women on their release from prison, by creating employment pathways into the construction industry. She was part of the team that developed the very successful UTurn Construction Pathways Program at the Adelaide Women’s Prison, a unique program that gave incarcerated women work experience and training on a live construction site within the prison. Sarah is passionate about improving conditions for incarcerated women, and focusing on their specific needs to gain better outcomes.

Marayca Lopez

Criminologist/ Justice Planner, DLR Group, United States

Marayca is an expert consultant of distinguished ability and accomplishment in the field of criminal justice with an extensive education and international background in penology and criminology. Having exclusively dedicated her academic and professional careers to the justice sector, she possesses a keen understanding of the overall criminal justice system.

Her body of work is international in scope. She has participated in a wide array of criminal justice reform projects and prison studies, both domestically in the USA and abroad (e.g., Australia, Canada, Europe, Central and South America), resulting in worldwide expertise and a deep understanding of correctional best practices, prison operations, and innovative models for offender management and intervention.

In her current role as a Justice and Civic Sector Planning Leader for DLR Group she is responsible for planning and programming multiple correctional facilities that are holistic in their approach, preserve human rights, promote rehabilitation, healing, and treatment, are safe and humane, and focused on innovative operational and programmatic models for positive behavioral change and successful re-entry.

Whether as volunteer, collaborator, or lobbyist, she is actively involved with different international organizations that share the common goal of advancing the field of criminal justice and improving conditions of confinement for individuals deprived of liberty. She has an on-going collaboration with the UN Friends of Corrections and Penal Reform International (PRI) on issues related to the humanization of prisons, monitoring of detention practices, and improvement of incarceration conditions.

Advancing Corrections Journal - Edition #18 - What Is Working With Women: Correctional Practice in the Post Bangkok Rules Era (ACJ18-A003)

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