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Saving Face: Adaptive Reuse Of A Twentieth-Century Psychiatric Center, Taylor M. Hughes

Architecture Theses

As humans, architects have their own prejudices and beliefs, and often times, those can affect their work, particularly when designing such facilities that were historically stigmatized. My thesis looks at one typology in particular - psychiatric centers, formerly known as asylums and mental hospitals. The life cycles of their architecture can be looked at in three parts: their uses, their abandonment and their futures.

The psychiatric centers of the nineteenth century were designed to be comfortable and humane, offering fresh air and sunlight to all residents, sometimes even teaching skills and trades to the residents. However, the layout of such …