Institute

Outside of the New York Institute

An **Institute** is a base of operations for Shadowhunters . They are found in every major city across the world and are often located in churches or built on holy ground.

## Purpose

Institutes serve as the local power bases of the Nephilim where they oversee all tactical missions within their locality.

Institutes also serve as symbols of the power and sanctity of the Nephilim, standing as monuments to the Angel  and glorification of their mission. Institutes are Nephilim homes, as much as Idris  itself is, though Shadowhunters and members of a certain region's Clave branch sometimes have their own homes in the area and rarely stay at the Institute, aside from the heads, its wards and its occasional guests. The corollary to this is that Institutes are the responsibility of all Shadowhunters, not just the Shadowhunters who are stationed at a particular Institute.

While mundanes are not allowed into Institutes under normal circumstances, the Law allows for Shadowhunters to offer mundanes sanctuary if they are in imminent danger from any demon or Downworlder -related attack, as long as the situation does not compromise the secrecy and safety of the Shadow World .

The same holds true for Downworlders. Typically, no Downworlder can come into Institutes without being invited in by a Shadowhunter. They may be hosted or held in the Institute for shelter, interrogations, meetings, or for the simple maintenance of their cordial relations, particularly those who assist the Nephilim. Those guilty of minor violations are also sometimes held in the keeps of Institutes.

## Hierarchy

* Head of the Institute
* Head of Security
* Weapons Master
* Training Master
* Team Leaders
* Shadowhunters

## Components

Institutes are also protected by wards —"magical walls" that protect against demons. Although the wards of the demon towers of Alicante prevent electricity and similar power sources from working reliably inside its borders, the weaker wards of Institutes typically do not cause this problem. Most Institutes today are wired for electricity, or at worst gaslight, although witchlight  is often used for atmospheric effect or as a backup in places where electrical supply may be unreliable. There are exceptions, of course—a few of the Institutes in more historically besieged areas, or more remote locations, are either too warded or too far from mundane civilization to use modern power sources.

Institutes are connected to angelic powers using angelic power cores in their basements, allowing them to keep angelic magic running in their walls without being subject to theleylines .

## Facilities

Each continent has an Institute that contains the Great Library for that region of the world; each of these is the largest Institute on its respective continent. Often with these libraries are galleries showing the glory of that Institute, if there is no separate room for it. Spoils, at least those which have yet to be returned after it was made illegal, were kept and placed on display as historical curiosities.

Each of these larger Institutes has the capacity to house hundreds of Shadowhunters, although some Shadowhunters do not permanently live in an Institute.

Institutes also have a weapons room and a training room. Shadowhunters are at liberty to enter the training room and develop their fighting skills at any given time. There are usually beams along the ceiling to allow Shadowhunters to practice flips, and a locker room attached to the training room for the Shadowhunters to store spare clothes while they train.

Institutes should generally always be well-stocked with a selection of varieties of weapons, from bows to seraph blades, made of all kinds of materials chosen for their magical properties, in addition to other basic useful combat tools such as: binding wire of silver, gold, and/or electrum; wooden stakes in oak and ash.

Each Institute also has basic amenities to tend to the needs of its inhabitants. They have a considerably large and well-put together kitchen, and a formal dining room, able to seat over two hundred comfortably. Additionally, there are around two hundred bedrooms in the residential wings, open to Shadowhunters and others who wish to take up residence there. They all have infirmaries for healing injured Shadowhunters.

## Known Institutes

* Baghdad Institute
* Bangkok Institute
* Barcelona Institute
* Beijing Institute
	+ Previously run by Jia Penhallow
* Berlin Institute
* Budapest Institute
* Buenos Aires Institute
* Cairo Institute
* Cardiff Institute
* Cluj Institute
* Copenhagen Institute
* Cornwall Institute
* Cyprus Institute
* Dublin Institute
* Edinburgh Institute
* Frankfurt am Main Institute
* Geneva Institute
* Istanbul Institute
* Kyoto Insitute
* Lahore Institute
* Lagos Insitute
* Lisbon Institute
* London Institute
* Los Angeles Institute
* Madrid Institute
* Manila Institute
* Marrakech Institute
* Marseilles Institute
* Melbourne Institute
* Mexico City Institute
* Moscow Institute
* Mumbai Institute
* New York Institute
	+ Run byLydia Branwell
* Oslo Institute
* Paris Institute
* Reykjavík Institute
* Rio de Janeiro Institute
* Rome Institute
* Shanghai Institute
* São Paulo Institute
* Stockholm Institute
* Taipei Institute
* Tokyo Institute
* Vatican City Institute
* York Institute