The purpose of the article is to examine Yuri Lotman’s models of the semiosphere and of semiotic spaces in literature and culture in the context of the spatial turn in cultural studies. It argues that Lotman’s writings anticipate the ‘spatial turn’ in cultural studies. Lotman’s semiosphere is a metaphor, which offers a spatial model for the interpretation of culture. A semiosphere is surrounded by a boundary. Its internal places are discontinuous and heterogeneous as well as homogeneous in some respects. Typical constellations of the locations within the semiosphere are opposition and bipolar asymmetry. Furthermore, the semiosphere is a space which can in some respects include itself in a way in which the included space is an icon of the including space. The article shows that Lotman’s topography of the semiosphere has undergone a change from a structuralist to a post-structuralist conception of culture.