Letters to the Editor: Malibu residents love showing hometown pride on their license plates

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To the editor: I loved Patt Morrison’s piece on personalized California license plates (“From stamped metal to digital, the strange history of our GLDN ST8 PL8S,” Sept. 29). I’m a native Angeleno and have been living in Malibu for the past 20 years. I’ve always marveled at how many Malibuites give a shoutout to their hometown with “BU”-themed plates — “BU BORN,” “BU MAMA,” “BU SURF,” etc. I started taking photos of them, and every so often would post a half dozen on a group I created on Nextdoor.

After doing that for a while, I had amassed quite the collection, and decided to assemble a photo montage as an art piece, which was on display at the local Tracy Park Gallery this summer. The piece, titled “Bu Plate Special,” has 122 plates organized thematically (starting with “BU,” ending with “BU,” “PCH,” “Zuma,” “Pt. Dume,” etc.). I’ve collected another 20 since the piece was completed, yet I’m sure it’s still a small fraction of all the plates out there.