Soft Territories

This study explores the structure of urban territory as its central perspective to explore the micro-spatial interactions between urban territorial arrangements and potted plants in contemporary cities. In the contemporary urban context, territory is no longer merely a physical demarcation defined by ownership or planning; rather, it emerges as a spatial process constantly generated and negotiated through residents’ actions, perceptions, and aesthetic practices. As a flexible and small-scale green medium, potted plants have become an important interface connecting urban territorial configurations with individual aesthetic experience. Drawing on Henri Lefebvre’s theory of the production of space, this paper re-examines how potted plants—long regarded as decorative or private objects—can be reinterpreted as spatial and artistic interventions embedded in the socio-political structure of the city. These plants typically appear in transitional spaces between residential areas and urban boundaries, actively participating in Lefebvre’s spatial triad: representations of space (institutional and planning logic), representational spaces (the symbolic and perceptual dimensions of everyday life), and spatial practice (embodied actions of residents). Incorporating Edward Soja’s concept of “Thirdspace,” this study further argues that the hybridity, generativity, and sensory intervention embodied in potted plants constitute a form of “micro-politics” at the urban margins, reflecting both the re-appropriation of space and emotional identification with micro-territories. Although such practices are modest in scale, they inject warmth, individuality, and ecological imagination into the abstract and functionalist order of urban space, forming a non-institutional mode of spatial artistic engagement. This paper proposes viewing potted plants as perceptual interfaces and cultural media within the production of contemporary urban territories, offering a new perspective on the entanglement of ecology and subjectivity in urban spatial dynamics.