are crowded with people on tiptoe.
They’re straining for a better view of la calenda, a lively and vibrant procession
with blaring trumpets and drums celebrating Oaxaca’s 486th anniversary.
Hundreds of costumed dancers—some inside giant papier-mâché puppets—
promenade in a haze of firecracker smoke. Families from across the state join
the festivities, dressed in the ancestral garb of their villages and carrying elabo-
rate baskets on their heads.
It’s a marvelous display in this low-key, low-slung place that serves as the
same-named state’s capital. Here, traditions span centuries, even millennia. But
they’re not what I’ve come for. I’m on a quest to find the new Oaxaca, a city so
abuzz with creative energy you can hear it 3,000 miles away in mezcal bars
from Seattle to West Hollywood—where it seems as if everybody is either just
back from or about to go on a trip to this cradle of agave.
I first visited on a mother-daughter vacation almost a decade ago, and it was
perfect for doing mom things. We stayed at a bougainvillea-covered B&B and
toured the pre-Columbian archaeological site at Monte Albán. We watched
chocolate being ground at the shops on Calle Mina, ate our way through the
markets, and dined in white-tablecloth restaurants dishing up regional moles
from recipes that’d been handed down for generations. I also tasted my first sip
of mezcal, a spirit distilled from fermented, fire-roasted agave, which many
people at the time dismissed as moonshine.
Since then, mezcal—tequila’s smoky sister—has become the hottest drink on
the U.S. bar scene, and Mexico has experienced a wave of social upheaval.
Oa xaca has evolved from hippie to hipster and is fast becoming the destination
del día for the international creative class. Tourism is up by nearly a third since
my first visit, with travelers drawn by the deepening mezcal culture, innovative
new restaurants, a thriving contemporary art community, and charming bou-
tique hotels carved out of restored colonial buildings. But instead of abandon-
ing its history to chase trends, the latest generation of artists and entrepreneurs
is striking a delicate balance: using the past to inform the future and define its
modern soul.
I get my first glimpse of this new Oaxaca while walking through the city with
Darinel Silva, a mild-mannered guy in a newsboy cap who hails from Miahuat-
lán. Silva started leading tours of markets and distilleries about four years ago
for Experience Mezcal. “People used to come for Monte Albán and Árbol del
Tule, said to have the greatest girth of any tree. Now they come for food and
mezcal,” Silva says. A third of his clients say they were moved to visit afterwatching the episode of Netflix’s Chef ’s Table in which
one of Mexico’s best-known chefs, Enrique Olvera,
credits Oaxaca with inspiring his celebrated mole madre.
Olvera has since opened a restaurant here, Criollo, and
I’m on a quest to experience it too.
As we stroll through a plaza near the church, I spot
Los Amantes, a tiny, rustic mezcalería that I remember
from before. As recently as 2011, it was one of the few
bars in town that served nothing but the locally pro-
duced spirit, neat. Today,
you can buy Los Amantes
at BevMo! in the United
States, and the brand has
expanded in Oaxaca to
include a $200-a-night
boutique hotel with con-
temporary artwork andAbove: Iconic San-
to Domingo church.
Right: Tour guide
Omar Alonso of
Oaxacking at the
Museo de la Filate-
lia (stamp museum).THE IN
OF THE
TOWERING
DE
66 OCTOBER 2018 ❖ SUNSET