Lesson B3: Why is that building a funny shape?
By Sue Carter and Gail Brown, Redhills Primary
Click on the St Thomas workhouse wheel plan above left, to see a larger version. Other images show close up details and can be enlarged in the saem way.
Look at the original wheel plan of the St Thomas workhouse. It identifies the uses of the rooms and the segregation of the buildings and yards for men and women. Make the point that many workhouses across the country were laid out in this way. (There is a simplified plan at the bottom of this page, more suited to printing out for the children.
Tasks: Children to examine the detailed close ups from the plan on the whiteboard to find out what rooms were used for and discuss. Compare their plans from the previous lesson with the simplified plan of the workhouse. Discuss the similarities/differences. Where did the overseer have their office?
This child is comparing the workhouse to her own plan
Redhills Community Primary School
So, why exactly is the workhouse such a funny shape?
Philippe Planel, researcher on this project explains:
- "The answer is control. The expression "control freak" is a new one, but the Victorians really were control freaks. This extended from women's clothing (corsets which restricted movement) to the architecture of prisons and workhouses. The wheel shape was a popular design for workhouses for 'divide and rule' purposes. Men, women, and children could be segregated, each with their own yard area. The New Poor Law workhouse unions covered around 50 parishes and workhouses processed large numbers of people efficiently and without sentiment; families and individuals lost all notion of freedom once they entered. However, paradoxically, the medical care and food was superior to that available to the average working person or family."
Simplified plan of the workhouse. (Right click to copy and print from a PC)
Simplified plan of workhouse for photocopying
RAMM, from the DRO original