Traditional dress often worn by women, especially older ones and most commonly during celebrations, in the Yucatan Peninsula; the squarish, intricately embroidered "cape" around the neck is the jubón or solapa; the blouse below the jubón is the huipil; the lower "skirt" part secured at the waste is the fustán; the three parts together may be referred to as the terno; copyright-free image courtesy of "Comvaser" made available through Wikimedia Commons.In most of Mexico, even in villages where the predominant language is of native American origin, not Spanish, most people wear regular street clothing. In more conservative areas mostly popuated with indigenous people, usually the men dress in street clothing, but the women may or may not wear traditional dress. Only in really isolated areas, usually deep in the mountains and especially in Chiapas and Oaxaca, do both men and women often dress in the traditional ways.
Though in mercados we often find stalls selling serapes and perhaps even some pretty, embroidered huipiles, conservative Indigenous Mexicans may acquire their traditional dress inside or outside mercados, maybe from someone in their village who specializes in making the product, or possibly they or someone in their immediate families make their own.
However, nowadays traditional dress on sale in Mexico may very well be made in China, where even regional motifs may be mass-embroidered onto the cloth. Producing works of arts like that at the right may take months, while a Chinese machine can knock off one after another in a matter of minutes, even if destined for sale in a particular ethnic region. Chinese mass-produced items are only a fraction as durable as handmade ones, but they are much cheaper.
Locally woven, sarape-like quexquémitls at the handcrafts market on the main square of Santo Tomás Jalieza, Oaxaca; copyright-free image courtesy of "AlejandroLinaresGarcia" made available through Wikimedia Commons.If names like "serape" and "huipil" through you for a loop, you might be interested in the following list of useful Mexican-Spanish words:
- ceñidor: traditional Indian belt or sash
- enredo: a wide, seamless cut of cloth used by Indian women as a skirt
- guayabera: in the Yucatán, a short, loose, pleated shirt
- huipil: sleeveless cotton blouse worn by Indian women, often ornately embroidered
- jáquima: cloak made of palm frond, used against rain
- jorongo: sleeveless jacket worn by men
- morral: squared bag with a shoulder strap
- quexquémitl: as seen at the right, a serape-like article of women's clothing with a head opening, worn with the two long corners descending in front and back
- rebozo: long shawl used to cover the head and shoulders of women, and often to carry a baby on the back
- sarape: serape in English -- large, usually ornamented, rectangularly woven cloth without a head opening, worn draped over a shoulder
- terno: a hand-embroidered dress consisting of three parts, the parts varying with region
Traditional dress of women among the Triquis people forming a cultural island surrounded by Mixtec people in northwestern Oaxaca; detail of a copyright-free image courtesy of "ChavadorPaz" made available through Wikimedia Commons.