Jailhouse Chic: Investors Remake Germany's Disused Prisons

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/disused-prisons-in-germany-turned-into-hotels-and-apartments-a-936949.html



As inmate numbers in Germany steadily decline, some states are selling off unneeded correctional facilities to private investors. The result is a new brand of high-end apartments, hotels and event centers housed in renovated former prisons.

Jailhouse Chic: Investors Remake Germany's Disused Prisons
By Stephan Degenhardt
December 03, 2013 – 01:06 PM

Thomas Richter-Mendau, a 45-year-old private investor, recently gave a tour through the site of his latest high-end real estate project: a former prison in the northeastern German town of Stendal. He stood in the middle of the corridor, clutching his blueprints and kicking a bit of debris out of the way. "There, those two cells will be a bedroom," he said, pointing at two eight-square-meter (90-square-foot) recesses. He turned slightly to the left. "Those two will be made into a children's bedroom." Another turn. "Back there, we'll tear out the walls and put in a sliding door, make a big open-plan kitchen. Seems clear, right?"

Richter-Mendau continued through the former penitentiary. The tiled containment room for prisoners on suicide watch? That will become a living room with space for a big couch. The massive oak doors, numbered 1 to 98, that lean against the walls? "We'll put them in front of the new apartments. As a warning to people to behave!"

The saws that cut through the brickwork, over 100 years old, beneath the cell windows, reveals a view of nearby Stendal Cathedral. "With that view, I'd move in here right away," Richter-Mendau enthused.

Prospects are looking similarly good in many such former prisons. In cities across Germany, investors are converting disused jails into apartments, hotels or event centers. Just a few years ago, many German prisons were overcrowded, but now prisoner numbers are declining. About 79,000 people were serving sentences or detention 10 years ago, but last year that number was barely 66,000. Many of Germany's federal states are taking advantage of this decline to consolidate their inmates into a few large prisons.