Group 1 Bullet Border Trinket Tray

Group 1 was built on the grounds of former Kings Park State Hospital to help with the ever expanding patient population. Built in large part according to the Kirkbride plan of hospital construction, Group 1 consisted of ten buildings: Buildings 111-117 were interconnected in a semi-circle arrangement while Buildings 118-120 stood as detached cottages nearby.

Opened December 29, 1898, Group 1 was built with a capacity of 1,200 patients – 338 men and 682 women; the former would occupy the three detached cottages while the latter were housed in the inter-connected building. Group 1 also contained a kitchen and dining room, where both male and female patients would take their meals together.

By the mid-later decades of the twentieth century, a number of variables contributed to the gradual downsizing and closure of mental hospitals nation-wide. This included the introduction of psychotropic drugs, the advent of community-based services and activism of mental-health and disability rights advocates. The declining hospital population at Kings Park resulted in the abandonment of its remaining buildings, including Group 1.

Group 1 would succumb to acts of vandalism and arson following its abandonment in the mid-1960’s. Following a series of fires in 1971, Group 1 was to be razed in its entirety, leaving an empty plot of land in its wake.

-Courtesy of @PreserveKPPC (follow and support on IG/ Facebook!)

I did not know of this group of buildings for a long time. The history of the hospital is quickly vanishing before our eyes and so much has been lost already. I make these pieces to keep the conversation going and to include these places/ buildings in our daily life, thus giving them life.

This piece is discounted because a cat hair landed on the front while the topcoat was curing.