As I make my way through the ornate façade of what appears to be a city hall, I soon realize that I have entered into the indoor swap meet at Plaza Mexico – a kitsch mall that has become a landmark of California’s Latino identity revival. Located in Lynwood, the atmosphere here is a far cry from the WASPy Los Angeles of my youth in the 1970s. Upon entering, I was greeted with a replica of Mexico City’s famous Angel of Independence monument in the rotunda, along with the recognizable eagle and serpent from the country’s coat of arms. Once a Montgomery Ward department store, I now walk through this Mexican-inspired building and experience a Latino equivalent of Disneyland.
The Plaza Mexico is a modern-day interpretation of a sleepy Mexican town, with vendors embracing an unpolished and cobbled-together aesthetic that Latino art critics call “scratching.” During my visit, I see a variety of products for sale, including a garden fountain with a small Jesus figurine inside an old cerulean-blue tub, and what appears to be four bronze bowling pins floating like spaceships at its center, being sold for $320. I also encounter Asian women working in a brightly lit nail salon and a small concession stand offering tamales, chimichangas, and “elotes con Hot Cheetos,” which is a unique street food made with fresh corn.
Plaza Mexico is a testament to a new kind of “Latinidad,” which is distinctively Californian and working-class, grounded in the state’s diversity and the people’s faith in the increasingly elusive American dream. While “Latino” has become synonymous with “mixed,” the miscegenation in California has become increasingly complex. A few decades ago, the idea of a Latino cultural revival would have been unimaginable. The venue that is now the Plaza Mexico was once known as “Lily White Lynwood,” where locals frequented a drugstore soda fountain and mostly white, blue-collar customers shopped in department stores. Latino identity was often associated with manual labor and servitude in the popular American imagination of the time.
However, by 2020, Lynwood had almost 90 percent Hispanic population. Over the past few decades, similar demographic and cultural shifts have taken place in the working-class suburbs of Southern California. According to the 2020 census, about half of Los Angeles county’s population identified as Hispanic. The influx of immigrants from Latin America has transformed life in California in countless ways, from our eating habits to our love entanglements. As such, many non-Latino Californians live in daily contact with Latinos in their workplaces or neighborhoods. This cultural shift has resulted in Latino leaders being active in most levels of state government, with Latino legislators in Sacramento helping to pass laws granting driver’s licenses and in-state college tuition to undocumented individuals.
The transformation in Lynwood and other similar neighborhoods is driven, in part, by California’s boom-bust cycles and the widening economic and racial disparities that accompany them. The construction of Interstate 105, which would link the newly developed suburbs of southern Los Angeles County, led to the buying of vast tracts of real estate in the 1970s by California’s Department of Transportation. This resulted in a cut in half Lynwood, and the value of properties plummeted. As middle-class black families moved to Lynwood when white families left, “Lily White Lynwood” began to collapse. Monty Ward closed, and Lynwood along with its neighboring Compton became Latino neighborhoods as the crises in Mexico and Central America led to a significant number of immigrants moving north. The Chaes, two Korean brothers, purchased the old Montgomery Ward building and turned it into an indoor swap meet that catered to a predominantly Latino clientele.
Architect David Hidalgo is now 65 years old and has witnessed the transformation of Greater Los Angeles into a Latino metropolis during his lifetime. After the Department of Transportation’s acquisition of vast tracts of real estate, Hidalgo’s family moved from downtown Los Angeles to the then majority-white suburb of La Puente in the late 1950s. Hidalgo became a surfer during his teenage years, catching waves at Huntington Cliffs, but he began to deeply connect with his Mexican-American identity while studying in Mexico during college. As a young architect, he became known for his façade renovations on older commercial properties. In 2000, the Chaes approached Hidalgo and asked him to design a shopping center in Lynwood in the style of a Mexican town. To create the Plaza Mexico, Hidalgo revisited Mexico several times, reconnecting with his old relatives, including a great-uncle who was a general in the army. He also played the role of a tourist, wondering about the essence of Mexican culture as he walked through old colonial cities and archaeological sites like Chichén Itzá in the Yucatán. When the Chae brothers agreed to transform the former Montgomery Ward, Hidalgo brought all those elements into the crucible of his brain, resulting in the creation of Plaza Mexico.
At Plaza Mexico, the Latino community has embraced the invitation to celebrate their culture. Outside the mall, children take selfies in front of a concrete fountain of feathered serpents — replicas of the ancient stone sculptures found at Teotihuacán. Since the mall’s opening in 2004, installations erected by Mexican states, including a statue of Pancho Villa and a reproduction of the iconic Aztec Piedra del Sol, can be found throughout the mall. Latinos have reinvented themselves within Mexican and Central American towns of family traditions, now separated from them by increasingly guarded borders. When school is out, parents frequently take their children to the old-fashioned merry-go-round located near the outdoor patio crafts stand run by vendor Álvaro García, who has operated his business in Plaza Mexico for a dozen years, alongside his brother. Zapotec is his first language, and Spanish his second. Originally from Oaxaca, Garcia sells primarily imported textiles, and while he managed to survive the pandemic, many others have not been so fortunate. He knows of ten families that have moved back to Oaxaca, “entire families,” he adds. When asked whether he still views California as a land of opportunity, he responds in Spanish that “it’s over,” that people in Mexico don’t comprehend how difficult life is in California. Lynwood is a city where three-bedroom homes can cost upwards of $600,000. Garcia says he tries to help his Mexican relatives understand that California isn’t Easy Street, stating: “We sleep on the floor. Luxuries, bastard…there are none here.”
Plaza Mexico represents a Latino version of the California dream — one that is told by those who have long been excluded from the state’s offerings. This mall embodies a new American way of being Latino; a cultural mix that has arisen from interactions with a variety of different cultures. Architectural historian Alec Stewart notes, for example, that many of Southern California’s indoor swap meets, including Plaza Mexico, were built by Korean entrepreneurs and resemble textile markets in Seoul. By hiring folk dancers and mariachi bands to attract working-class customers, these Asian companies catered to a predominantly Latino and black clientele. Like the individual architectural styles that Plaza Mexico incorporates, the old racial and ethnic labels (black, white, Hispanic, Asian) no longer fully capture the cultural mix we see on the ground. California is undergoing a transformation, and its polyglot present is a harbinger of the nation we are becoming.
Hector Tobar, a Los Angeles-born author of six books, recently published “Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings…”
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Passing through the ornate façade of a faux city hall, I enter the indoor swap meet at Plaza Mexico, the kitsch mall that is a landmark of California’s Latino identity revival. I’m in the city of Lynwood, but the atmosphere is nothing like the WASPy Los Angeles of my youth in the 1970s. In the rotunda that serves as the entrance to the Plaza, I find a copy of the Angel of Independence, a famous Monument in Mexico City commemorating the beginning of Mexico’s fight for secession from Spain. The replica of the Mexican municipal building, or city hall, features the eagle and serpent from the coat of arms of Mexico. This building was once a Montgomery Ward department store. Now I walk through it and enter the Latino equivalent of Disneyland.
Plaza México is a ghostly translation of a Mexican town, where vendors have created an aesthetic that Latino art critics call scratching, which means cobbled together and unpolished. During my visit, I see a store that offers a garden fountain with a little Jesus inside an old tub painted cerulean blue, and what appears to be four bronze bowling pins floating like spaceships around it; Sale $320 Asian women work in a nail salon bathed in bright fluorescent lighting. A concession stand offers tamales, chimichangas and an exotic delicacy made with fresh corn: elotes con Hot Cheetos. Call it Mexicoland: a new kind of “Latinidad” that is working class and distinctly Californian, grounded in the diversity of the state and our faith in an increasingly elusive American dream. If “Latino” is already a kind of synonym for “mixed”, in California this miscegenation has become increasingly complex.
A few decades ago, this revival of Latino culture would have seemed unlikely. In the 1960s, the future Plaza México venue was known as “Lily White Lynwood.” Locals drank vanilla Coke at a drugstore soda fountain downtown, and department stores catered to a white, blue-collar clientele. A Los Angeles Times reporter would later remember it as a time of “drivers, Boy Scouts and high hopes.” However, these happy days only shined for a few. In the popular American imagination of the time, Latino identity was often equated with service, manual labor, and servility. This persists today, as Latino immigrants are routinely denigrated in the media, their countries of origin equated with barbarism and poverty.
However, by 2020, Lynwood was almost 90 percent Hispanic. In the past half century, the working-class suburbs of Southern California have undergone a similar demographic and cultural shift. In Los Angeles County, about half the population self-identified as Hispanic in the 2020 census. Immigration from Latin America has transformed life in the Golden State in countless ways, from our eating habits to our love entanglements. Whether at their workplaces or in their neighborhoods, many non-Latino Californians live in daily contact with Latinos. Cultural significance is often the prelude to political power. A generation after Californians voted for ballot measures that limited the teaching of Spanish in schools and barred undocumented immigrants from accessing public services, Latino leaders are now active at most levels of state government. In Sacramento, Latino legislators have helped pass laws that grant driver’s licenses and in-state college tuition to the undocumented. In Lynwood, there are Latino majorities on the City Council and the school board.
Here, these changes have been driven, in part, by California’s boom-bust cycles, and the widening economic and racial disparities that accompany them. When the California Department of Transportation bought large tracts of real estate in the 1970s to build Interstate 105, the freeway that would link the newly developed suburbs of southern Los Angeles County, Lynwood was cut in half and the value of properties plummeted. Middle-class black families moved to Lynwood when white families moved, and “lily-white Lynwood” began to collapse. The Montgomery District closed. Lynwood and neighboring Compton became Latino neighborhoods as crises in Mexico and Central America sent large numbers of immigrants north. Meanwhile, two Korean brothers, the Chaes, bought the old Montgomery Ward building and transformed it into an indoor swap meet-up catering to a largely Latino clientele.
Architect David Hidalgo, 65, watched Greater Los Angeles become a Latino metropolis during his lifetime. His father grew up in downtown Los Angeles during the Zoot Suit era, but moved the family to the then-majority white suburb of La Puente in the late 1950s (a neighbor once mistook the mother for de Hidalgo with a housekeeper). As a teenager, Hidalgo became a surfer who caught waves at Huntington Cliffs, but began to connect more deeply with his Mexican-American identity when he traveled to Mexico as a college student. As a young architect, he earned a reputation for doing façade renovations on older commercial properties. In 2000, the Chae brothers came to his office and asked him to design a shopping center in Lynwood in the style of a Mexican town.
Give the Latino families in Lynwood a taste of the old country, it was thought, and maybe they’ll spend some of their hard-earned money, too. To create his market, Hidalgo returned to Mexico several times, reuniting with old relatives, including a great-uncle who was a general in the army. Above all, he played the tourist. “What is the essence of this culture?” Hidalgo wondered as he walked through old colonial cities and archaeological sites, including Chichén Itzá in the Yucatán. “I brought all these elements into the crucible of my brain,” he says.
At Plaza México, the Latino community has accepted the invitation to celebrate their culture. At the outdoor mall, I see kids taking selfies in front of a concrete fountain of feathered serpents, replicas of the ancient stone sculptures found at Teotihuacán. I find installations erected by Mexican states after the mall opened in 2004, including a statue of Pancho Villa and a reproduction of the iconic Aztec Piedra del Sol.
A walk through the mall reminds you that Latin American culture can be monumental, beautiful, and heroic. Here, Latinos reinvent themselves within Mexican and Central American towns of family tradition, territories now separated from them by increasingly guarded borders. When school is out in the afternoons, vendor Álvaro García watches as parents take their children to the old-fashioned merry-go-round next to their outdoor patio. craft, or crafts, stand. Garcia, 64, told me that he and his brother have operated his stand in Plaza Mexico for a dozen years. Zapotec is his first language; Spanish his second. He first immigrated to the United States in 1995 and worked in the tomato field, then in a Chinese restaurant, before finally starting his own business. Most of what García sells are textiles imported from his native Oaxaca. Somehow, his Plaza México booth survived the pandemic.
But not everyone made it through the hard times. “I know of 10 families that have moved back to Oaxaca,” he says. “Entire families”. When I ask him if he still thinks of California as the land of opportunity, he answers in Spanish: “It’s over.” I mean, that’s over. People in Mexico don’t realize how difficult things are in California, she adds. Lynwood is a city where three-bedroom homes can cost upwards of $600,000. Garcia says he tries to disabuse his Mexican relatives of the notion that California is Easy Street. “We sleep on the floor,” he tells them. “Luxuries, bastard: There are none here.”
Boosters have long portrayed California as a utopia where people can reinvent themselves and become rich. In a way, Plaza México is a Latino version of that story, told by those long excluded from what the state has to offer. Here, I have seen a new American way of being “Latino” coming together from contact with many different cultures. For example, architectural historian Alec Stewart has noted that Korean entrepreneurs built many of Southern California’s indoor swap meets, such as Plaza Mexico, to cater to a predominantly Latino and black clientele, and bear a strong resemblance to markets Seoul textiles. These Asian companies could hire folk dancers and mariachi bands to attract a working-class clientele.
Like the individual architectural styles that Plaza Mexico incorporates, the old racial and ethnic labels (black, white, Hispanic, Asian) don’t quite capture the drama of the cultural mix we see on the ground. California is getting over all of that; its present polyglot foreshadows the nation we are becoming.
Hector Tobar is a Los Angeles-born author of six books, including, most recently, “Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of ‘Latino’.” deb loyal is an artist, director, and photographer currently based in Brooklyn and Oakland, California. Her work explores time and memory through color and composition.
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