The spaces we inhabit shape who we become. But what does that mean for the people who have no choice where they live?

Yvonne Jewkes is a professor of criminology, author, and leading expert on prison architecture.

She has spent her career studying what echoing corridors, metal doors and harsh fluorescent lighting do to the people living inside prisons — and designing spaces that restore rather than punish.

This conversation is also very personal. Yvonne spent more than a decade restoring a crumbling Regency townhouse, only for her partner to leave midway through the project. The house became tangled up with grief and the slow unravelling of the relationship itself.

We explore the strange overlap between prisons and homes: the human need for dignity, sanctuary and control over our surroundings and the instinct to create beauty even in the bleakest places.

If you enjoyed this conversation, Yvonne's book An Architecture of Hope: reimagining the prison, restoring a house, rebuilding myself is a powerful exploration into the universal need for sanctuary.

To hear more from us:

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Matt Gibberd’s book, A Modern Way to Live, is available here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320176/a-modern-way-to-live-by-gibberd-matt/9780241480496

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