Jail hotels: Narratives and spatialities of custody and care 

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School of Arts, Design and Architecture | Master's thesis
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Date

2020

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Mcode

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Language

en

Pages

165

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Abstract

“Jail Hotels: Narratives and Spatialities of Custody and Care” is a study on former prison buildings repurposed for the use of the hospitality industry. It follows my previous research on the adaptation of hotel spatial structures and layouts in cinematic narratives, and their reflection on the plot of films that use hotels as their main location. I decided on four case studies in planning the study of jail hotels—Movement Hotel and Lloyd Hotel and Cultural Embassy—by intrigue, as one was a pop-up endeavour on a controversial site and coexisting concurrently with multiple subjectivities, aims, objectives, and agendas. The other was established as a high-end cultural centre targeting a niche clientele. The next two were based on geographical proximity: Best Western Katajanokka in Helsinki and Kakola Hotel in Turku, Finland. In this study, I introduce a hypothesis on hotels demonstrating an international neutral taste and relying on invisible maintenance mechanisms and labour. The following presentations of case studies evidently eliminate this hypothesis early on, in the case of jail hotels, where the emphasis is on uniqueness—manifested differently on each site—and the marketization of the history, identity, and currentness are key assets. Prior to the conclusion, I offer an interjection with an extensive record of a discussion I hosted in Bengtsår, Finland, in August, 2018. This part of the presentation draws upon the practice of focus group assemblies in qualitative research and was part of the third iteration of Trojan Horse Summer School: “The Choreography of Money”.

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Supervisor

Ryynänen, Max

Thesis advisor

Ryynänen, Max

Keywords

heritage hotels, hospitality, non-places, prisons, architecture, custody, care, biopolitics

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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:aalto-202006213869

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[master] Taiteiden ja suunnittelun korkeakoulu / ARTS