Homeless in a Hostile City - Part 9

A homeless man, Pawel Koseda, was found dead last year; bled out, impaled on the six-inch spikes of the metal fence that surrounds St Mary Abbots in Kensington, UK.

He had high levels of alcohol in his blood and was wearing hospital pyjamas under his clothes.

Koseda used to be a university lecturer in Poland.

Ed Boord, who found the body, said that several people walked by and didn’t even notice. Said Boord,

“It upset me that someone like that

spends their life not being noticed, and

even in their last moments people still walk past.”

(Continued in Part 10)

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'Homeless in a Hostile City' is a collection of ten short stories that highlight the social and emotional impact of hostile architecture in urban centres around the world.

The City of Toronto makes an event out of opening its doors to the public. At the same time, the city installs and supports the installation of defensive or hostile architecture designed to shoo people away.

There is a dichotomy between DoorsOpenTO and the City's use of defensive architecture.

“Making our urban environment hostile breeds hardness and isolation. It makes life a little uglier for all of us.”

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Source: 'Homeless in a Hostile City' is based on a February 2015 article in The Guardian.