5th Year Architecture Students recently installed an exhibition titled “Reconstructing Incarceration” at MAINSITE Contemporary Art Gallery. The exhibition presented the students’ work from the special topics studio taught by Prof. Marjorie Callahan and Dr. Keith Gaddie. Explore the virtual tour of the exhibition below.
The exhibition and the students’ work “aims to create design solutions to the defects we found in the current jail system we have today in America.” Using the Oklahoma County Jail as a case study, the student redesigned every aspect of the jail focusing on the themes of “autonomy among detainees, a building modeled after mixed-use development, and community involvement.”
The exhibit was split into five main parts: Master Plan, Cottage Design, Exterior Spaces, Gathering, and Jail Tech. Visitors to the exhibit could explore the students’ designs, and in many portions, they were able to interact with the exhibit in order to understand the principles of incarceration that the students chose to focus on, including deterrence, incapacitation, retribution, and rehabilitation. The students previously traveled to Washington DC earlier this semester to present their project to the State Department.
Learn more about the Reconstructing Incarceration project at the OU Daily, NPR StateImpact Oklahoma, and News9.
View photos from the exhibition in the gallery below.
The Gibbs Design in Action Awards (GDAA) program, led by Dr. Wanda Liebermann, has announced its 2026–2027 funded student projects. The initiative supports design and research work that addresses social, cultural, and economic issues in the built environment through collaboration with faculty and community partners.
The OU Institute for Quality Communities (IQC) 2024 collaboration with the Historic Threatt Filling Station has been recognized in the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City's newly released Byways Report: The Scenic Route to Rural Prosperity – a story-driven publication exploring how road trip culture and place-based tourism can fuel economic growth in rural communities.
The Gibbs College of Architecture is pleased to announce that Camille Germany, Chief of Staff, has been named the 2026 recipient of the university-wide Jennifer L. Wise Good Stewardship Award.
