01 INMATE 101

from Yuan Zhou-Graduate Architecture Portfolio 2023

by Yuan Zhou

LOUISIANA TECH SCHOOL OF DESIGN

Reimagining a new incarceration center

Inmate 101 is a project for ACSA competition which celebrates steel structure in any architecture types.

I took an interest towards the United States incarceration system and found that 25% of the world’s prison population belong to United States alone. With an intent to reside this broken system, I designed Inmate 101 as a new incarceration center that allowed the low- and medium-risk inmates to participate the educational and vocational programs offered in addition to their new sanitary rooms.

The main focus of this project is to bring light to the misconceptions of the incarceration systems and using architecture to redefine it as a rehabilitation center rather than a jail cell.

25% of the world’s prison population are in the United States

2X as many people incarcerated in local jails waiting trial and presumed innocent than the entire federal prisons combined

92% of these prisoners are considered non-violent

33% are recidivism cases due to parole violations

Juvenile Most US states incarcerates 16 year olds as adults while European countries still trialed 18-21 year olds as legal minors vehicular circulation to parking garage vertical circulation pedestrian to single loaded units

MODULE COMPONENTS

MODULE STRUCTURE

Longitudinal Section

Bringing back the lost links of campus connections

LINK is an extension to the Arizona State University where students can be interconnected with the public. Located at the corner of the site, I saw an opportunity to connect and link the different site nodes: education, business, housing, and entertainment.

This project challenged me to think of the sustainability qualities of architecture, dedicating design choices based on COTE requirements. Especially located in Phoenix, Arizona, LINK required sustainability efforts in order to fight the unrelenting heat.