#i was reading this fun book on victorian london and it mentioned “prisons built in the panopticon design” | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

theaxolotlkween · 7 months ago

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WHO WAS GOING TO TELL ME THAT SIR ROBERT SMIRKE WAS A REAL PERSON WHO DESIGNED THE FRONT OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND THAT MILLBANK PRISON WAS AN ACTUAL PLACE THAT EXISTED BUT IT GOT DEMOLISHED IN THE EARLY 1900’S AND THE TATE BRITAIN IS NOW LOCATED IN ITS STEAD!?!?

#also learned that smirke designed the london ophthalmic hospital which was moved to a different spot later #it’s moorfields eye hospital now #just thought that was funny given the circumstances #i was reading this fun book on victorian london and it mentioned “prisons built in the panopticon design”#and i was like hey i know that word that’s a thing that’s in the magnus archives #and the book said it talked a bit more on panopticon-style prisons on a different page #so i went to that different page and lo and behold there was millbank prison and sir robert smirke #and then i went on a wild wikipedia spree #which brings us all up to date #i’m sure some people reading this are like #“reeve you dumbass of course robert smirke and millbank prison were real there’s no way jonny sims could make up a name like robert smirke”#but consider i only went to london once and did not get to see nearly enough #also every time i looked it up before this i just saw the tma wiki pages and thought those things weren’t real #tma #the magnus archives #panopticon #robert smirke

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