The Stories of Street Furniture

Everything has a story — including that street couch in your neighborhood. As USC professor and creator of streetcouch.com Keith Plocek puts it: “Just think of all the sitting. All the conversations. All the silences. Life. Death. Butts. Pets.” And then one day, that piece of furniture ends up on the street and a new story begins — a lucky find for someone, a new canvas for a graffiti artist or an addition to the landfill. In a recent story for the Los Angeles Times, reporter Julissa James explored the range of experiences with street furniture, from the joy of a good find and refurbishing job to the queasy questioning of what’s in those cushions, especially in the age of COVID-19. We’ll talk about the culture of street furniture and hear your street furniture stories.