{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,24]],"date-time":"2025-12-24T16:58:44Z","timestamp":1766595524219,"version":"3.48.0"},"reference-count":42,"publisher":"University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress)","issue":"2","content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Canadian Journal of Health History"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,1]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>Abstract.<\/jats:p>\n                  <jats:p>This paper presents a significant case study in the history of care architecture. It illustrates how the work of care, mothering, and architectural production can be inextricably linked \u2013 albeit often invisibly. It builds on the scholarship of Annmarie Adams and Cynthia Hammond, who have each argued that certain groups of women, historically credited only with domestic, medical, or caring skills, also had significant spatial knowledge and influence. Helen House (Oxford, UK, 1982) was the first paediatric hospice in the world. Designed by architect John Bicknell of Bicknell and Hamilton (London, UK) and accommodating eight children at a time, the house was named for Helen Worswick, a child who, at two years old, was found to have a brain tumour. In this paper, I tell the story of Helen House from the perspective of its architecture, specifically tracing the contributions of Helen's mother Jacqueline, Helen House founder Sister Frances Dominica Ritchie, and Helen herself. First, like Adams and Hammond before me, I demonstrate that the story of Helen House and paediatric hospice care is yet another where non-architect women carers were deeply involved in creating architecture. Second, I suggest that even down to the name, Helen House leveraged domesticity and mothers\u2019 expertise to create a more palliative architecture for children with life-limiting illness \u2013 reinforcing the long-running image of the domestic sphere as a woman's, more specifically a mother's, domain. Finally, I argue that the creation, design, and building of Helen House served as a testing ground for the new care philosophy, allowing it to grow and come into its own spatially, functionally, and theoretically.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3138\/cjhh.704-062024","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,24]],"date-time":"2025-12-24T16:55:22Z","timestamp":1766595322000},"page":"481-504","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["\u201cWho Were the \u2018Experts\u2019 Here Anyway?\u201d: Mothering, Architecture, and Terminal Illness in Oxford, 1978\u201395"],"prefix":"10.3138","volume":"42","author":[{"given":"Fiona L.","family":"Kenney","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1696","reference":[{"key":"r1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Jacqueline Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen: The Development of Hospice Care for Children\n                      , 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 87\u20138.","DOI":"10.1093\/acprof:oso\/9780192632357.001.0001"},{"key":"r2","unstructured":"Throughout the paper, I use first names for the Worswick family, not to indicate familiarity but to distinguish between Jacqueline, Richard, and Helen."},{"key":"r3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Jeanne Kisacky,\n                      Rise of the Modern Hospital: An Architectural History of Health and Healing, 1870\u20131940\n                      (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2017), 344.","DOI":"10.2307\/j.ctt1x76g5f"},{"key":"r4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","DOI":"10.1515\/9780773565869","author":"Adams Annmarie","year":"1996","journal-title":"Architecture in the Family Way: Doctors, Houses, and Women, 1870\u20131900"},{"key":"r5","unstructured":"Alice T. Friedman,\n                      Women and the Making of the Modern House: A Social and Architectural History\n                      (New York: Abrams, 1998), 96."},{"key":"r6","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 25."},{"key":"r7","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 26."},{"issue":"2","key":"r8","first-page":"251","volume":"6","author":"Adams Annmarie","year":"2016","journal-title":"Change over Time"},{"issue":"2","key":"r9","first-page":"89","volume":"48","author":"Sloane David Charles","year":"1994","journal-title":"Journal of Architectural Education"},{"key":"r10","unstructured":"Adams, \u201cHome and\/or Hospital,\u201d 251."},{"key":"r11","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 15."},{"key":"r12","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 34."},{"key":"r13","unstructured":"McGann,\n                      The Production of Hospice Space\n                      , 26."},{"key":"r14","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 52."},{"key":"r15","unstructured":"For the history of specialized hospitals for children, see David Charles Sloane\u00a0and Beverlie Conant Sloane,\n                      Medicine Moves to the Mall\n                      (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003); Annmarie Adams and David Theodore, \u201cThe Architecture of Children's Hospitals in Toronto and Montreal, 1875\u20132010,\u201d in Cheryl Krasnick Warsh and Veronica Strong-Boag, eds.\n                      Children's Health Issues in Historical Perspective\n                      (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2006); Victoria Bates, \u201c\u2018Some People Talk about Children as Though They're Completely Different\u2019: Hospital Art, Architecture and Design for Children in Modern Britain,\u201d\n                      Medical Humanities\n                      (2025), 1\u20138."},{"issue":"1","key":"r16","volume":"3","author":"Chelazzi Cosimo","year":"2023","journal-title":"Journal of Anesthesia, Analgesia, and Critical Care"},{"issue":"6459","key":"r17","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1667","DOI":"10.1136\/bmj.289.6459.1665","volume":"289","author":"Burne S.R.","year":"1984","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"},{"issue":"10","key":"r18","first-page":"628","volume":"44","author":"Balk David E.","year":"2020","journal-title":"Death Studies"},{"key":"r19","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 74."},{"key":"r20","first-page":"14","author":"Jencks Charles","year":"2010","journal-title":"The Architecture of Hope"},{"key":"r21","unstructured":"Jencks\u00a0and Heathcote,\n                      The Architecture of Hope\n                      , 14."},{"key":"r22","unstructured":"Jencks\u00a0and Heathcote,\n                      The Architecture of Hope\n                      , 14."},{"key":"r23","unstructured":"McGann,\n                      The Production of Hospice Space\n                      , 61."},{"key":"r24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"59","DOI":"10.1177\/000271628044700108","volume":"447","author":"Holden Constance","year":"1980","journal-title":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science"},{"key":"r25","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 76\u20137."},{"issue":"18","key":"r26","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2669","DOI":"10.1016\/j.ejca.2003.08.003","volume":"39","author":"Dominica Sister Frances","year":"2003","journal-title":"European Journal of Cancer"},{"key":"r27","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 236."},{"key":"r28","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 83."},{"key":"r29","first-page":"125","volume-title":"The Complexities of Care: Nursing Reconsidered","author":"Aranda Sanchia","year":"2006"},{"key":"r30","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 35."},{"key":"r31","unstructured":"Adams,\n                      The Family Way\n                      ; Annmarie Adams,\n                      Medicine by Design: The Architect and the Modern Hospital, 1893\u20131943\n                      (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2008); Chiara Briganti and Kathy Mezei, eds.\n                      The Domestic Space Reader\n                      (Toronto, Buffalo, London: University of Toronto Press, 2012)."},{"key":"r32","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 82\u20133."},{"key":"r33","unstructured":"Adams,\n                      The Family Way\n                      , 8. The role of women, particularly mothers, in caring and healing at home pre-dates the Victorian era."},{"key":"r34","unstructured":"Burne, Dominica, and Baum, \u201cHospice for Children,\u201d 1665."},{"key":"r35","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 142."},{"key":"r36","unstructured":"See Mignon Duffy,\n                      Making Care Count: A Century of Gender, Race, and Paid Care Work\n                      (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2011)."},{"key":"r37","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 113."},{"key":"r38","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 228."},{"key":"r39","unstructured":"Worswick,\n                      A House Called Helen\n                      , 228."},{"key":"r40","unstructured":"\u201cWorld's First Child Hospice,\u201d Building Design no. 604 (July 1982), RIBA Archives."},{"key":"r41","unstructured":"Tony Hill, \u201cHelen House News\u201d (Autumn 1997)."},{"key":"r42","unstructured":"Dominica, \u201cDouglas House,\u201d 2669."}],"container-title":["Canadian Journal of Health History"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/utppublishing.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.3138\/cjhh.704-062024","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,24]],"date-time":"2025-12-24T16:55:40Z","timestamp":1766595340000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/utppublishing.com\/doi\/10.3138\/cjhh.704-062024"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,1]]},"references-count":42,"journal-issue":{"issue":"2","published-print":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,1]]}},"alternative-id":["10.3138\/cjhh.704-062024"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3138\/cjhh.704-062024","relation":{},"ISSN":["2816-6469","2816-6477"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2816-6469","type":"print"},{"value":"2816-6477","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,1]]}}}