A more domestic feel
Part of Once There Were Walls, Safehouse 1, London, 2019.
A speaker plays a selection of guidelines from the Department of Health’s ‘Health Building Note 03-01’ for Adult Acute Mental Health Units. Particular focus is paid to the attempt to promote a sense of domesticity without incorporating the apparent risks domestic interiors pose. The ambition is to avoid the appearance of an institutional environment while still maintaining the utmost security and safety.
Four photographs found in my father’s storage documenting a range of empty and unknown domestic interiors taken while looking for a flat to rent in the early ‘90s are mounted in polystyrene frames on the walls. My father worked as a psychiatrist in the US before moving to London with me and my mother.
Photos by Alexander Edwards.