6 Key Design Concepts for Forensic Mental Health Facilities

By Craig Blewitt and Andrew Greig

Cover Image: Glenside Mental Health Campus, Swanbury Penglase and MAAP Architects

It is well understood that prisoners, as a group, have significantly worse health than the general population with research confirming that prisoners have higher rates of mental illness, substance use disorders, personality disorders, intellectual disability, acquired brain injuries, autism and cognitive impairment. Studies have shown that, compared to the general community, prisoners are:

• 3-5 times more likely to have a mental illness [1]

• 10-15 times more likely to have a psychotic disorder [2]

• 20 times more likely to have an acquired brain injury [3]

Studies have also shown that 42% of prisoners have a psychiatric risk rating indicating mental health concerns [4].

The challenge in most jurisdictions is that there are few, if any, purpose built forensic mental health facilities; and where they do exist, demand greatly outstrips supply. As a result, many prisoners with acute mental health concerns are placed in accommodation that only serves to aggravate their mental health conditions. Some of the most moving and emotional project briefings we’ve experienced have been for specialist mental health facilities, where experienced custodial and forensic mental health staff have had tears in their eyes as they’ve spoke about some of the individual cases where they’ve been unable to find an appropriate place for some prisoners, which has at times led to tragic outcomes.

So how do we as designers make a difference for mentally ill offenders?

How can the design of mental health facilities aid recovery?

Here is a list of 6 proven design strategies that we’ve employed in our projects to create therapeutic mental health environments that aid recovery and rehabilitation.

1. Design for Therapy

Our physical environment is constantly influencing our emotions and general well-being. The layout of a room, space or building directly affects a patient’s perception of safety and privacy and impact their willingness to self-disclose and to build therapeutic rapport with clinicians and therapists. Poor layouts can exacerbate feelings of otherness, reduce communication, and have poor therapeutic outcomes.

Thomas Embling Mental Health Hospital, MAAP Architects & DesignInc

Careful consideration of the layout and amenity of a room is especially important for spaces where therapy and counselling services are facilitated. Consideration of colour, materials, lighting, aspect and furnishings can all help to create a comfortable therapeutic experience for emotionally vulnerable individuals.

The integration of sensory modulation elements that utilise weighted, movement, tactile, vibrating, squeeze, and auditory modalities to manage distress and agitation is a proven approach to regulate and de-escalate patient behaviours.

Effective sensory modulation practice increases service users’ awareness of their sensory preferences and assists them to manage their arousal through the application of sensory strategies. [5]

2. Prospect & Refuge

‘Prospect-Refuge’ is a theory that postulates that primal man is predisposed psychologically to like places where they can see without being seen, because their survival often depended on it. In a forensic mental health facility context, this means the creation of spaces where passive and discreet means of observation are utilised to reduce a patient’s perception of being watched.

Ginger Curtis on urbanologydesigns.com

Within indoor and outdoor communal spaces, the placement of furniture against walls and in smaller groups can create pockets of privacy where patients can withdraw themselves and have a sense of safety and seclusion. Long distance views to landscape areas beyond the communal spaces can further enhance the sense of prospect and comfort. Within bedrooms, the placement of beds against walls with a clear line of sight to the door, can help to provide a sense of physical security and comfort for patients with heightened paranoia.

3. Space

The size of indoor and outdoor communal spaces should be generous to enable patients to move around within the unit without feeling crowded or overly constrained.

The need for space cannot be overemphasised as a means of reducing the potential for aggressive behaviour, by way of wide corridors and recreation areas large enough to avoid crowding. [5]

The dayroom and courtyard spaces of forensic mental health facilities should be designed to facilitate communal gatherings of the cohorts within each unit but should also incorporate smaller pockets of privacy that patients can withdraw to whilst still being observed by custodial or clinical staff. The scale and volume of communal spaces should be varied to provide interest and to cater for the differing social and sensory preferences of the patients.

Ravenhall Correctional Centre, Guymer Bailey Architect. Photography by Scott Burrows

4. Natural Light and Artificial Lighting

Integral to biophilic design is the provision and quality of natural and artificial lighting, including the impact that lighting has on circadian rhythms.

Variations in ambient illumination impact behaviours such as rest during sleep, and activity during wakefulness, as well as their underlying biological processes. Rather recently, the availability of artificial light has substantially changed the light environment, especially during evening and night hours with nocturnal electric lighting shown to alter circadian rhythms and sleep patterns. On the other hand, light can also be used as an effective and non-invasive therapeutic option, to improve sleep, mood and general well-being.

Recently we have been working with lighting controls that adjust the colour tone and brightness of electric lighting to reflect natural lighting, and this has been shown to assist in regulating circadian rhythms, normalising sleep patterns and reducing Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).

5. Connection to Nature

Windows of bedrooms and communal living spaces that are positioned to capture views to landscape areas beyond the building have been shown to help to regulate patient behaviour. Being in nature, or even viewing scenes of nature, reduces anger, fear, and stress and increases pleasant feelings. Exposure to nature not only makes patients feel better emotionally, it contributes to their physical wellbeing, reduces blood pressure, heart rate, muscle tension, and the production of stress hormones.

The best form of interior design is a window!

Rivergum Residential Treatment Centre, Guymer Bailey Architects. Photography by Scott Burrows

Courtyards should be designed to reduce the patients’ sense of being contained and provide some form of sensory stimulus such as textured ground surfaces, shaded areas and attractive but sturdy fixed furniture. Where permitted by spatial and security constraints, raised garden beds, grassed terraces and undulations in the ground plane should be considered to create more defined spaces within the landscape providing they do not hinder passive surveillance.

6. Acoustics

Ravenhall Correctional Centre, Guymer Bailey Architect. Photography by Scott Burrows

The acoustic environment of a correctional centre is unique. Due to the need for the buildings to be constructed from robust, hard wearing and durable materials; communal spaces, corridors, cells and bedrooms generally have high reverberation rates. As a result, the sound of buzzing electric locks, clanging heavy steel doors, conversations and even footsteps are amplified throughout the patient areas.

Whilst this may just be an annoying nuisance for some, it can also be a recurring trigger that causes the behaviour of patients with a mental health illness to escalate. As such, special consideration is provided to managing acoustic reverberation within mental health and high needs units through careful use of appropriate absorptive material, design that avoids rectangular forms and acoustic separation between spaces.

What does the future hold?

With increasing community recognition of mental health conditions and the reduction in the stigma associated with treatment, the need for mental health services across all segments of the community will continue to grow. As the demand rises, there will be an ongoing need for new specialist facilities designed to cater for the unique needs of patients with a wide range of mental health conditions; as well as a need to upgrade existing facilities to introduce best practice rehabilitative design.

References

1. Victorian Ombudsman Report (2014).  Investigation into deaths and harm in custody, p.111.

2. Victorian Ombudsman Report (2015) - Investigation into the rehabilitation and reintegration of prisoners in Victoria, p. 32.

3. Victorian Ombudsman Report (2015) - Investigation into the rehabilitation and reintegration of prisoners in Victoria, p. 34.

4. Victorian Ombudsman Report (2014).  Investigation into deaths and harm in custody, p.114.

5. Sensory Modulation in Acute Mental Health Wards : Te Pou

Guymer Bailey Presents: 10 Queensland Boredom Busting Locations for School Holidays

The school holidays are nearly upon us and if you are like most parents, you are already dreading hearing “I’m bored!”

To save your sanity we thought we’d share some of our family-favourite Brisbane projects to bring you 10 boredom busting activities that are sure to be a hit with the kids these school holidays.

Please note that while we are still impacted by COVID-19 you may like to check the following locations to see what capacity they are operating in.

1. Frew Park Arena Play Structure, Milton

Photography: Scott Burrows Photographer

While the Arena Play Structure provides play experience for all age groups and abilities, it specifically targets players of 10 to 15 years. The play structure includes slides, climbing walls, swings, nets and ropes, hang-out spaces, and interactive spaces designed to fuel the imagination. It even features a Commentary Box, which is a steel-mesh box suspended eight metres above the ground, offering greater thrill to playground goers.

There is a reason why this multi-award-winning playground is a favourite of Brisbane kids and parents alike, the Arena Play Structure resembles no other playground around. Built on the grounds where the iconic Milton tennis stadium once stood, its theme ’deconstruction’ honours its history with contemporary play precincts that reflect stadium spaces.

2. Mary Cairncross Scenic Reserve Rainforest Discovery Centre, Maleny

Photography: Scott Burrow Photographer

The Mary Cairncross Scenic Reserve Rainforest Discovery Centre is an iconic conservation, education and tourism Centre located in the Sunshine Coast Hinterland with exceptional views of the Glass House Mountains. The Reserve is a living museum of the diverse plant life including a complex notophyll vine forest that once covered the Blackall Ranges

At the Rainforest Discovery Centre you can view the rainforest from above on the elevated Glider Gallery Boardwalk, learn more about the local flora and fauna through fun interpretive displays or take in the breathtaking view of the Glasshouse Mountains on the observation deck. You can grab a bite at the Mountain View Café or utilise the barbecues and picnic shelters near the playground.

3. Kings Beach, Caloundra

Photography : Scott Burrows Photographer

Looking for a day at the beach but wanting to avoid the busy beach areas of the Gold and Sunshine Coasts? Check out Kings Beach at Caloundra.

Take a walk along the beachfront boardwalk to explore the parkland, make a splash in the iconic Kings crown waterplay area, take a dip in the beachfront pool or enjoy a swim in the ocean.

There are also plenty of picnic and barbeque stations around the surrounding esplanade and grassed areas.

4. Queens Park Nature Centre, Ipswich

Photography: Guymer Bailey Landscape

The Queens Park Nature Centre offers a range of Australian wildlife exhibits that have been recreated to represent local bushland and habitats. Within the park you and the family will Get to see wombats, wallabies, emus, birds, and barnyard animals up close in beautifully landscaped gardens, all for a gold coin donation. Make a day of it by bringing a picnic and letting the kids have fun in the Queens Park playground across the road.

5. David Fleay Wildlife Park, Burleigh Heads

Photography: Scott Burrows Photographer

Located in Burleigh Heads on the Gold Coast, the David Fleay Wildlife Park is home to many native animals and birds including eagles, brolgas, jabiru, owls, and cassowaries, as well as kangaroos, koalas, crocodiles, snakes, lizards, platypus, and dingoes.

A key highlight is the Fleay’s in Flight show where you get to see the wing spans and speed of the park’s birds of prey.

6. Maroochy Arts and Ecology Centre, Maroochydore

Photography: Scott Burrow Photographer

The Maroochy Arts and Ecology Centre is in the Maroochy Regional Bushland Botanic Gardens and is a specialised arts and ecology interpretative centre that hosts activities and events, with a focus on exploring the relationship between art and nature. 

The Centre showcases green initiatives by mixing both passive design and active systems to allow visitors to witness ecological sustainability in practice through efficient solar, air and water use.

It is also a great opportunity to explore the Botanic Gardens around the Centre, that have been designed based on the four elements of Earth, Air, Fire and Water, that shape and influence the natural landscapes of the Sunshine Coast.

7. Eumundi Markets, Eumundi

Photography: Guymer Bailey Landscape

World renowned, the Eumundi Markets are the biggest and best art and craft market in Australia. Open every Wednesday and Saturday, you will find beautifully handcrafted homewares, furniture, artworks, fashion, and jewellery as well as lots of fresh produce, baked goods, and gourmet delights.

8. California Lane, Fortitude Valley

Photography: Scott Burrows Photographer

California Lane is the newest Brisbane laneway precinct behind the popular Brunswick Street in Fortitude Valley, Brisbane. The laneway aptly incorporates retro elements from the nostalgic years of California with pastel walls, neon signs and tall palm trees leading you back in time to the 1960s, honouring the old California Café, once located at Carroll’s Corner in Brunswick Street.

The laneway features boutiques, cafés, and eateries, making it an ideal spot for a different dining experience. While you are there, be sure to check out Bakery and Winn Lanes as well.  

9. Kingfisher Bay Resort and Hotel, Fraser Island

Photography: Kingfisher Bay Resort

This was our founding project way back in 1989 and it established the field of eco-tourism. Kingfisher Bay Resort and Hotel offers a unique holiday destination with villas, houses and the main hotel nestled into tree-covered dunes that overlook the Great Sandy Strait.

The Kingfisher Bay Resort and Hotel features four swimming pools, four restaurants, three bars, tennis courts and water sports, as well as a general store, gallery, and day spa.

10. The Local Aquatic Centre

Photography: Scott Burrow Photographer

If you’re lucky to find a warm day through the holidays why not take the kids to the local pool! We can personally vouch for the Clem Jones Aquatic Centre, Ferny Hills Aquatic Centre, Kings Beach Saltwater Pool and Maryborough Aquatic Centre, though let’s face it, on a warm Queensland day, any pool is a good pool.

Visualisation in Correctional Architecture

By Mitchell McDonald Roberts

Visualisation in correctional architecture can sometimes be overlooked, after all, what purposes do pretty pictures have in building prisons? However, visualisation serves a pivotal and surprisingly wide-ranging function when it comes to creating correctional facilities. Below I have outlined four, sometimes unexpected, ways visualisation helps us design, co-ordinate, and build better correctional facilities.

1. Conceptual Visualisation

Up until recently (historically speaking), architectural visualisations were created by pen and pencil, inked out by specialists commissioned by architects, to understand how their work would fit into the real world. With the advent of the computer and digital modelling, visualisation has become increasingly accessible to architects. Smart designers and firms quickly understood the value of fast and dirty, early stage renders to showcase form, materials, and context. On the back of efficient and high-quality 3D modelling, Guymer Bailey creates still images, walkthroughs, and virtual tours to aid in the design process. 

In correctional architecture, concept visualisations in the early stages of a project allow us to accurately understand our architecture in the way physical models did in previous eras. How does the sun impact our most sensitive spaces? How do adjacent buildings affect sightlines and sun shading? In what ways do materials affect the feel of our mental health facilities? 

In the early stages of a correctional project, Guymer Bailey focuses on accurately modelling our architectural, interior, and landscape concepts in 3D. Because of this rigor, it allows us to more comprehensively, and quickly, explore our project in a rendered environment, giving us better, real time, feedback. 

Render accuracy is extremely important, particularly in the early design phases, since detailed and well-executed visuals can denote issues and allow designers, engineers, and builders to anticipate potential complications that would otherwise require project compromises. A quality render can become a tool to getting the desired result at completion.  

- Hana Abdel "Renders vs. Reality, Projects From Renowned Architects: Before and After"

2. Visual Coordination

Pretty visualisations have their place, but on a day-to-day basis we need to understand how our building works, and so does our consultant team. Correctional architecture presents a myriad of technical and construction challenges that differ from other architectural typologies.

Services co-ordination, security integration, construction methodology, structural efficiency, just to name a few, are all far more critical to get right in the early stages of the project.  Employing visualisation for things like clash detection with services, understanding security sight lines, and staff/inmate experience, can help us find issues sooner and communicate solutions more easily.

3. Staff and Visitor Experience 

Up until now, we have discussed how visualisation can help the architect and the greater consultant team, but there’s a crucial group we are missing, and that's the operators and users of our correctional facilities. Staff, visitors, and key stakeholders are an important forethought in prison design, so how can visualisation help these groups? 

 “By virtually prototyping a space, facilities operators can get a good sense of how the facility will be like to walk through and to engage with.”

- Gohta Shiraishi, Senior Interior Designer, Guymer Bailey

Systems such as VR, virtual tours, and 360-degree panoramas, allow groups such as emergency response teams, security officers, health workers, and administration staff to accurately understand the spaces they will be occupying before it exists.  Riot control teams can understand and practice entering spaces and executing manoeuvres in virtual reality. Security officers can understand sightlines from officer posts and dayrooms. Admin staff can appreciate the visitor process and navigation more easily.

4. Building Excitement

Prisons aren't just for prisoners, there are also a huge amount of people invested in the quality outcome of a correctional project. As great as the pragmatic uses of visualisation are, having beautiful images and videos of correctional projects generates excitement. This allows the public and stakeholders to understand where their money is going, displaying the new facility to potential staff, and showing the onsite construction team what they are working towards, which is something that is frequently overlooked.

Forensic Mental Health Design: The Master Planning and Design of the Ravenhall Correctional Centre

With statistics from the National Mental Health Commission showing that prisoners are 2-3 times more likely to have mental illnesses and 10-15 times more likely to have a psychotic disorder, the Ravenhall Correctional Centre was a game-changer in the delivery of mental health services and prisoner rehabilitation.

The Ravenhall Correctional Centre, which opened in 2017, also included the design of the Ballerrt Yeram-boo-ee Centre, the largest prison-based mental health facility in Australia.

Due to the focus on rehabilitation, the Ravenhall Correctional Centre caught the interest of Dr. Elizabeth Grant CF, Associate Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at RMIT University.

Dr Grant’s paper, ‘RAVENHALL CORRECTIONAL CENTRE: THE MASTER PLANNING AND ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN OF A MULTIFACETED, PEOPLE-ORIENTED PRISON FOR MEN WITH COMPLEX PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH NEEDS IN VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA’ has since been published in the Advancing Corrections Journal: Edition #9-2020.

Guymer Bailey Architects Director, Kavan Applegate, lead designer on the Ravenhall Correctional Centre, had the privilege of assisting Dr Grant with her research.

Kavan, who has a passion for rehabilitative correctional design is acutely aware of the crucial role design plays in creating an environment that makes rehabilitation and treatment both possible and desirable.

In his words, “Our environment changes how we interact with others and how we view ourselves. The master planning of secure accommodation needs to create communities that are engaging, uplifting, and interactive, and communicate a sense of safety and security, so prisoners are more likely to engage in rehabilitation and education programs.”

You can download Dr Grant’s full paper on Ravenhall through Academia and find part of the Abstract below.

“People with mental health issues are vastly overrepresented in the Australian prison system. This paper discusses the master planning and design of Ravenhall Correctional Centre in Victoria, Australia to increase outcomes for male prisoners living with physical, mental health disability and other conditions.

Major innovations in the design of Ravenhall Correctional Centre have included a forensic mental health unit on site, and the master planning of the prison into separate communities with a variety of housing types to provide prisoners opportunities to experience various levels of self-care and greater autonomy. The prison was designed to increase feelings of wellness, to provide program and training spaces to service various groups, and to allow prisoners to experience greater levels of individual control.

The project is discussed through an architectural lens to allow readers to understand the complexities of master planning and designing a major people-oriented, multi-faceted prison with a forensic mental health unit within the perimeter. The paper notes that large scale prisons may be designed in a more therapeutic manner where accommodation, facilities and programs can provide prisoners opportunities to connect with external environments, engage in meaningful activities and retain a level of autonomy and individual control.”

Read the full paper here.

Photography credit: Scott Burrows Photographer