Abstract This paper explores how semiotic resources are used to build individuals’ place-making during a walk around the Old Quarter in Hanoi, Vietnam. Using Lefebvre’s (1991) spatial triad as the perceived, the lived and the conceived, the paper uses a case study of a local participant and myself to consider how our differing perspectives affect place-making. I show how the local resident makes meaning using perceived resources in the here-and-now as backdrops for the lived, presented via his recounting of memories of activity spaces. I then contrast how these memories differ from the researcher’s place-making, where the conceived affects how I perceive the significance of visual resources on signs in the here-and-now. The study shows the value of Lefebvre’s (1991) triad for explaining the conflicting generalisations researchers have made about the nature of what is seen in the linguistic landscape or about the roles played by linguistic landscape in defining place.