Sabrina Puddu has guest edited the latest issue of The Journal of Architecture, Volume 28, Issue 7, titled Territories of Incarceration. Doreen Bernath was also involved as internal editor of the journal, and Katya Larina and Platon Issaias contributed the essays, The ‘perimeter’ prisoners of Russian secret cities: the case of ZATO Krasnoyarsk-26 and Rationalising violence: Leros, respectively.

In her introduction, Sabrina writes that the title, Territories of Incarceration, is also the title of Lisa Haber-Thomson’s doctoral thesis in architecture (2019) whose ambition was to ‘reveal architecture’s complicity in convening power’. Lisa is also one of the authors included in this issue. Sabrina draws from personal experience of living near penal colonies in her editorial opening:
‘I remember as a child travelling from the city to my parents’ village and, along an alternative route that we occasionally chose, passing through a settlement that was unlike anything we had encountered earlier in our journey. The car proceeded at a slow pace. We could not stop in the transit. We would curiously stare at the few men busy in some kind of manual labour on the edge of the road or in the fields far away. But eye contact must be avoided.’

With Beth Hughes, Platon writes on the history of rationalist architecture of the fascist Italian regime, using Leros in the Greek Dodecanese as a case study. Beth and Platon consider forms of surveillance, exile, detainment and incarceration. The journal is publicly accessable and available to download here. The Journal of Architecture is a peer-reviewed academic journal published eight times a year by Routledge on behalf of the RIBA.

Image: Cover of Territories of Incarceration, The Journal of Architecture, Volume 28, Issue 7.