Beyond These Gates
Community Memory & Justice-Centered Heritage Work
Remembering, Reclaiming, and Reimagining the Original Indiana Women’s Prison
Project Status:
In progress. Estimated completion date of March 2026.
Beyond These Gates is a collaborative remembrance initiative focused on the old site of the Indiana Women’s Prison, the first separate women’s reformatory in the United States, founded in 1873. As the now-closed prison undergoes a community-led redevelopment process, this project ensures that the voices and histories of formerly incarcerated women are not erased from the narrative.
This project is guided by the women who lived and served their time at IWP. The goal is to reclaim their complex relationship with the space and share these memories through storytelling, oral history, poetry, and facilitated dialogues. Through a collaborative process, Beyond These Gates surfaces the lived experiences of these women, transforming the prison’s legacy from one of erasure to one of recognition and justice.
The initiative will result in a podcast series documenting the process of memory work and public dialogue of contested spaces. Beyond the Gates will also create an online archive and toolkit to support inclusive, justice-centered heritage efforts. By amplifying the perspectives of those directly impacted, Beyond These Gates advances a model of community-led historic preservation that integrates lived experience into public memory and urban development.
Beyond These Gates is a collaboration with Better Idea Holding Company and partly funded by an Action Grant from Indiana Humanities.
Header image: Alayna Wilkening/Mirror Indy