Placing Lefebvre

Geographers have extensively used Lefebvre's concept of space as a social product as a framework guiding urban and political critique. Lefebvre articulates social space through a primarily ontological engagement: he describes a complex and multi-faceted object that exists in three simultaneous but distinct, co-producing registers. The famous triad has become canonical within Anglophone geography, but the implications of this ontology for knowing or researching the object of (social) space often remain implicit. This paper suggests that recent scholarship on place-making helps to address the latent epistemological challenges of operationalizing Lefebvre's triad. We trace linkages and gaps between Lefebvrian space and contemporary theorizations of relational place. Re-examining social space through the lens of relational place highlights the potential for links between epistemologically diverse recent research and twenty years of Lefebvre-inspired critique.