“I once lived and worked in a 2,000 bed, long stay hospital, set in beautifully designed grounds with a fabulous sweeping driveway that would put Peyton Place to shame. Built in the 1920s, it was originally designed as a Colony to house people with epilepsy and people cast out of society for the most spurious reasons. It then became the last port of call for people with learning disabilities. Harperbury hospital and the people who lived and worked there, will remain with me until my dying day.

Thousands of people were forced to survive in these ‘bins’. I know that sounds inflammatory. The long care system was originally created by Quakers as a sanctuary, a place of safety. What I witnessed was a system that was used and abused to cast off social rejects in an era of moral panics. People like you and me were too easily diagnosed, labelled and cast aside.

In the mid-1980s I found myself living and working in one of the larger institutions of the ‘Hertfordshire cluster’ where there were six huge self-sufficient hospitals, each built like villages to contain up to 2,000 patients.  I was training as a Dramatherapist and ran a women’s group in the Social Education and Assessment Centre, SEAC Unit, also known as The University on site. The Knitting Circle is written from the stories of some of the members of that group and from the testimonies gifted to me by people who survived the asylums.”

With these words Julie McNamara summarises the experience that motivated her to create The Knitting Circle.

The production gave us a chilling glimpse into a lost world and painted an extraordinary picture of the lives of women who survived Britain’s long care system. The involvement of those who gifted their stories for the production took many forms and continued throughout and long after the close of the tour at Bristol’s Brewery theatre in 2013. The documentary of the making of this work and the voices of some of the extraordinary people who entrusted us with their life stories will be available from Autumn 2017.