Hill Station: architecture and the altitudes of Empire installation

See how the city of Freetown, Sierra Leone, was shaped by health, architecture and empire.

Hill Station: architecture and the altitudes of Empire explores the architectural history of colonial-era health segregation in Freetown, Sierra Leone, and its entanglements with the expansion of the British Empire and the emergence of tropical medicine.

In 1899, the newly established Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine sent an expedition to Freetown to investigate malaria prevention. Among its recommendations was the construction of an exclusive enclave of “houses for Europeans” on a plateau overlooking the city.

Combining architectural model work and film, this new installation—part of a wider research project Salone Drift —explores architecture, colonialism, and health segregation, and the complex links between the two port cities, Liverpool and Freetown.

Designed on the recommendations of Dr. Ronald Ross in a report commissioned by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, the construction of this enclave, known as Hill Station, aimed to eradicate the risk of malaria transmission.

Developed through parallel forms of making, the installation investigates how Hill Station was shaped by Dr. Ronald Ross’s Nobel Prize-winning research on malaria transmission and colonial strategies of elevation and exclusion.

The film, shot across Freetown, Liverpool and London, features a contribution from historian Professor Ibrahim Abdullah and incorporates archival sources tracing medical and architectural planning. It interrogates the political decisions that led to the building of Hill Station and its roots in Ross’ Nobel Prize-winning research on malaria transmission.

The topographic model reconstructs Freetown’s coastal and urban terrain, laying bare the physical and social logics of partition that informed Hill Station’s siting and design.

Together, the film and model reveal how architecture operated as a tool of imperial control—mediating altitude, health, and habitation.

Opening times and location

RIBA North + Tate Liverpool, Gallery 2

Opens 4 September until 16 November 2025

Monday to Sunday including bank holidays: 10am to 5.50pm

Check our opening times and what else you can do when you visit.

Model Housejpg — Model House. Image: Killian O’Dochartaigh and Edward Lawrenson

Project by Killian O’Dochartaigh and Edward Lawrenson

Curatorial support and exhibition coordination by RIBA

Image credit: Killian O’Dochartaigh and Edward Lawrenson

Hill Station: architecture and the altitudes of Empire is supported by:

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