Things To Do in Guadalajara Mexico

Mariachi and Musical Heritage

Mariachi music was born in the state of Jalisco, and Guadalajara is its capital in every sense. The Plaza de los Mariachis, in the Santiago neighbourhood east of the historic center, fills each evening with musicians in traditional dress performing for anyone who asks and pays. The form — brass, violin, guitar, and voice in close harmony — has been recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage, and hearing it in its city of origin, rather than in a restaurant abroad, is an entirely different experience.

Tequila and Food

The town of Tequila, 65 kilometres northwest of Guadalajara, sits at the center of the only region in the world legally permitted to produce tequila, and the agave fields that surround it are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Tours from the city to the distilleries are a natural excursion, but the city itself has a strong food and drink culture rooted in Jalisco cooking: tortas ahogadas — a pork-filled sandwich drowned in tomato and chilli sauce — are the city's signature dish, deeply local and rarely found in the same form anywhere else.

Architecture and the Historic Center

Guadalajara's historic center is one of the best in Mexico, built around a series of plazas that step from the cathedral through the Teatro Degollado and out toward the Mercado San Juan de Dios. The Spanish colonial architecture is well preserved and used — the buildings house government offices, hotels, restaurants, and markets rather than serving as set dressing for a heritage district. The murals inside the Palacio de Gobierno and the Instituto Cultural Cabañas are among the most important examples of Mexican muralism outside Mexico City.

Technology and Contemporary Identity

Guadalajara has established itself as Mexico's technology hub — sometimes called the Silicon Valley of Mexico — with a large concentration of technology companies and a university system that produces engineering and design graduates who increasingly choose to stay. The Zapopan district, northwest of the center, is where most of the tech industry is based, and it has brought with it a contemporary creative culture of co-working spaces, independent cafés, and design studios that gives the city a dimension beyond its colonial heritage and musical tradition.

Mariachi, Tequila and the Cultural Traditions of Jalisco

Guadalajara is the origin city of two of Mexico's most internationally recognised cultural exports: mariachi music and tequila. The Plaza de los Mariachis, a few blocks from the city's historic market district, is the gathering point for the musicians who have sustained the tradition of ensemble brass, string, and voice performance that spread from Jalisco across Mexico and into the popular culture of the Americas. The mariachi tradition, a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage since 2011, is celebrated in the annual International Mariachi and Charreada Festival each September, which draws performers from across Mexico and abroad to the city where the form was codified. Tequila, the town 65 kilometres northwest and located within the Tequila Volcano UNESCO World Heritage agave landscape, is the production center of the spirit distilled from blue agave that takes its name from the town and whose production tradition dates to the 16th century. The Tequila Express train operates a tourist service on Saturdays from Guadalajara to the town, with distillery visits, mariachi entertainment, and tasting included in a format that conveys both the production landscape and the cultural context of the spirit.

Tlaquepaque, Tonalá and the Craft Traditions Around Guadalajara

The municipalities of Tlaquepaque and Tonalá, incorporated within the greater Guadalajara metropolitan area, are the most important craft production and retail centers in Mexico after Mexico City. Tlaquepaque's historic center, with its cobblestone pedestrian streets lined with galleries, craft boutiques, and restaurants in colonial buildings, specialises in blown glass, hand-painted Talavera-style ceramics, and furniture and has been the primary destination for decorative arts buyers from across North America since the 1970s. Tonalá, a few kilometres further east and the wholesale production center, concentrates the workshops and factories whose output supplies Tlaquepaque's retail, Mexico City's markets, and export buyers, with specialities in papier-mâché, blown glass, and hammered copperwork. The Thursday and Sunday street market in Tonalá is one of the largest craft markets in Mexico by vendor count and the most direct access to the production economy. The Hospicio Cabañas in central Guadalajara, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the largest colonial building in the Americas, houses the José Clemente Orozco mural cycle in its Tolsá Chapel — a program of frescoes that are among the finest works of 20th-century Mexican muralism and the most important single artistic achievement in the city. The Guadalajara International Book Fair (FIL), held each November and December at the Expo Guadalajara convention center, is the largest book fair in the Spanish-speaking world and the second-largest in the world by attendance after Frankfurt, drawing over 800,000 visitors and serving as the primary meeting point for publishers, authors, and booksellers from Latin America, Spain, and the international Spanish-language market. The Teatro Degollado on Plaza de la Liberación, a neoclassical opera house completed in 1866 and modelled in part on La Scala in Milan, is the home of the Guadalajara Philharmonic Orchestra and the most architecturally distinguished performing arts venue in western Mexico. The Mercado Libertad (San Juan de Dios), the largest traditional covered market in Latin America and a three-storey complex of food stalls, craft vendors, and bootleg goods, is the most democratic commercial institution in Guadalajara and the best single location for encountering the full range of Jalisco food culture from birria to tortas ahogadas under one roof.