Viva Fiesta on the River Walk!

The beautiful San Antonio River Walk is the perfect place to partake in the city’s vibrant Fiesta® celebrations.

FORD MARIACHI FESTIVAL This FREE, official Fiesta® event features Mariachi bands and Folklorico dancers floating along the San Antonio River Walk. April 5-7, Tuesday-Thursday 6:00 to 8:00pm

A tradition that began in 1972, the Ford Mariachi Festival is a threeday event sure to elevate your Fiesta spirit! Boats carrying Mariachi bands and Folklorico dancers from local schools, colleges and dance studios will serenade and entertain you, making frequent stops for visitors on the River Walk. This is the perfect time to sit outside, sip a margarita (as if you needed an excuse) and enjoy the music and dancing as these talented groups float by. The energy and excitement are contagious, and you might find yourself dancing along! There will also be performances on stage at the Shops at Rivercenter. Free to attend. For event details, visit www.TheSanAntonioRiverWalk.com/events/ ford-mariachi-festival.

Cannot make it to the River Walk? Catch the Facebook LIVE broadcast each day: facebook.com/TheSanAntonioRiverWalkOfficial.

FIESTA ARTISAN SHOW April 8-10, Friday-Sunday Friday & Saturday: 11:00am to 11:00pm Sunday: 11:00am to 8:00pm

The Fiesta Artisan Show lets you experience the beauty of the San Antonio River Walk while shopping over 40 handmade artisan booths, including pottery, textiles, jewelry, woodwork, paintings, beadwork and more. Vendor booths are located at the River Walk Extension, near the San Antonio Chamber of Commerce Building and the Shops at Rivercenter. Free to attend.

THE TEXAS CAVALIERS RIVER PARADE April 4, Monday 7:00 to 9:30pm

This one-of-a-kind parade started in 1941 after a group of Texas Cavaliers witnessed boats and barges decorated with flowers in the “floating gardens” of Mexico City. This coincided with the San Antonio River Bend Restoration, and the Texas Cavaliers decided to bring this unique experience to our city. The first Texas Cavaliers River Parade included a number of boats from schools, local businesses, civic organizations and the army. Texas Cavaliers and the parade sponsors decorated every float with bright flowers and vibrant colors, and the tradition of the River Parade began. 70 years later, the Texas Cavaliers still decorate the San Antonio River with the bold colors of Fiesta and fill the air with festive music, and all money raised supports local children’s charities through the Texas Cavaliers Charitable Foundation.

For tickets and parade route, visit www.TexasCavaliers.org.

Fantastic Fashionable FiestaFinds

Dos Carolinas Market Square

By Dawn Robinette Colorful ribbons and papel picado floating through the air, the smell of roasted corn and chicken-on-a-stick, everyone shouting “Viva!,” confetti in your hair and seemingly everywhere? San Antonio’s beloved Fiesta® is here! While the city’s celebration vibe never seems to stop, during Fiesta it goes to a new level. And that includes fashion. Do not miss out: from your head to your toes, there is no end to Fiesta fashion. Get your wardrobe in on the fun and wear your Fiesta spirit on your sleeve, feet and more.

ADELANTE BOUTIQUE

www.AdelanteBoutique.com

ANGELITA

www.AngelitaBoutique.webs.com

DOS CAROLINAS

www.DosCarolinas.com

HISTORIC MARKET SQUARE www.MarketSquareSA.com

NATIVA

www.NativaShop.com

PENNER’S

www.PennersInc.com

PLAZA TAXCO

www.PlazaTaxco.com

Plaza Taxco Always a great stop, Pearl is one of San Antonio’s top shopping, dining and entertainment destinations. A favorite for fashion finds that pop for Fiesta is Adelante Boutique. A San Antonio institution and a colorful fixture you cannot miss, its window displays draw you into a store filled with light, color and happiness reflected in tops, skirts, shoes and accessories exploding with the Fiesta spirit. Whether it is the perfect purse to carry your Fiesta musts, cute (and comfortable!) shoes designed for fun and jewelry you will not find anywhere else, all are great ways to up your Fiesta fashion. New items arrive weekly and Adelante’s on-trend but distinct looks make their selection—and your choices—more fun than what everyone else might be wearing.

Stroll a few doors down at Pearl and visit Dos Carolinas, the go-to shop for guayaberas. Designed to keep you feeling—and looking— cool, guayaberas combine comfort, style and fashion into the best men’s shirts in fit, drape and feel. Dos Carolinas shirts—and dresses for women who know this classic style always looks fabulous—can be custom-made with your choice of fabric and stitching. Natural, breathable fabrics in every color or pattern are paired with your choice of thread for custom embroidery in 36 stitch patterns. Snag a fantastic find in the store or let the talented team at Dos Carolinas make a one-of-a-kind fashion statement uniquely yours. you. Specializing in handmade items crafted by artisans all over Mexico, Nativa’s collection is curated and designed with great care and consideration. It is also a one-stop shop: you will find men’s, women’s and children’s clothing and accessories, plus home goods so you can dress your abode for Fiesta as well. The detail on the stitching—and the array of colors and designs—will leave you breathless. And in San Antonio, the designs are perfect for year-round wear.

For fantastic tree-lined shopping, stroll steps off of the River Walk and set a course for La Villita Historic Arts Village and Angelita where you are drawn in by fashions featuring natural fabrics, linen, succulent leathers and natural dyes. With easy style in breathable fabrics, you will find unique pieces that exude quality. The carefully curated collection provides stylish comfort that never fails to turn heads. You will also be drawn to Angelita’s jewelry collection, with statement pieces sure to become favorites far beyond Fiesta. Each piece is more fabulous than the next and will make any outfit seem even more fashionable.

Another La Villita stop for stunning jewelry is Plaza Taxco, featuring amazing jewelry from Taxco, Guerrero in Mexico. The pieces are handcrafted from locally sourced silver mines in Taxco, a “Pueblos Magicos” known for its sublime silver work. The jewelry reflects a vintage style given a modern flair and each is more exquisite than the next. The craftsmanship, paired with the quality of the

metal, combines to create pieces sure to become a favorite the moment you try them on.

Plaza Taxco is also a must stop in the dizzying array of shopping in Historic Market Square. With multiple shops, great finds, fantastic food and atmosphere, a trip to Market Square resembles shopping at a street market in Mexico. That is because it is the largest Mexican market outside of Mexico, with terrific imports and shopping set to the tune of Mariachi music and the tantalizing smells of various restaurants and food booths, making it a Fiesta year-round. You will find shop after shop with colorful, lightweight linens featuring fantastic Mexican embroidery, as well as straw hats, flower crowns and selections of bags and purses suited for the season. Paired with wonderfully cool silver jewelry handcrafted in Mexico, you are ready for Fiesta.

For men’s Fiesta shopping, make a beeline downtown to Penner’s. Do not be surprised if you start humming ZZ Top’s “Sharp Dressed Man” as you walk through the doors: the band’s Billy Gibbons buys shoes from the store whenever he is in town. One glance around the store leaves little doubt about how easy it is to dress sharply thanks to all of the men’s wear Penner’s offers. Standing proudly just steps from the River Walk, Penner’s has been dressing San Antonians for more than a century, with guayaberas in every color, stylish hats, colorful shirts, suits and its signature Stacy Penner shoes. Paired with the attentive service, it is impossible to walk out of Penner’s anything less than Fiesta-ready.

Penner’s

WRITER’S BIO

An award-winning communications expert who enjoys sharing new discoveries and revisiting old favorites in her adopted hometown, Dawn Robinette loves to tell stories. You can read more of her work at Alamo City Moms, San Antonio Woman, Texas Lifestyle Magazine and The Texas Wildflower.

Every day is a Fiesta at

open daily

With over 100 locally owned shops, you’ll find cultural curios and artifacts, hand-crafted leather goods, and a diverse collection of traditional apparel.

514 W. Commerce St. MarketSquareSA.com

04/30/22

Fiesta Royale By Susan Yerkes

1923 Order of the Alamo Duchess

Order of the Alamo Coronation, photo by Gary Stanko

2018 Order of the Alamo Duchess

Fiesta® San Antonio is the ultimate people’s party. It may seem strange, then, that a fantastic panoply of kings, queens and assorted royalty rule the 11-day celebration. In fact, the first Fiesta—a “flower parade” modeled on the court celebrations of Europe, took place in 1891, when kings, queens and emperors still ruled much of the world.

It celebrated the 1836 Battle of San Jacinto and Texas’ independence from Mexico. By 1895, the parade had become a weeklong celebration with its own royals. King Selamat (tamales spelled backwards), King Omala (Alamo backwards), King Cotton and, redundantly, King Rex ruled in the early years.

The most spectacular and longestlived royal court began with the Order of the Alamo—a prominent group of prosperous San Antonio civic leaders. Formed in 1909, it elected a queen, princess and duchesses chosen from the group’s debutante daughters—a tradition that continues today. The Coronation of the Queen has grown more richer in pomp and circumstance over the years. Today’s gowns, each in keeping with the royal court’s theme of the year, can run to six figures (paid by the family) and take many months to create. Tickets to the event, at the Majestic Theatre, are often sold out—if you go, ritzy dress is de rigeur. Cannot make it? Do not despair. The queen and her bodaciously bedazzled court appear again to wow the public with their sumptuous sequined trains arrayed behind them in the Battle of Flowers Parade. To shouts of “Show us your shoes!” they will hike up their royal robes to flash fun and funky footwear.

For a closer look at these amazing royal robes and a fascinating look at Fiesta history, check out the Witte Museum’s “Fiesta Vogue: Outfit of the Day,” on exhibit now through July. The Witte is the richest repository of the Order of the Alamo coronation gowns—some 250, ranging from 1911 to 2017 in their collection, along with the attire of other Fiesta royals. The show pairs coronation gowns from different eras with designer evening wear from the same period. The show includes the evolution of regular folks’ Fiesta wear, too, from the ethnic outfits that Conservation Society volunteers wore (and also sold) at their 1949 Night In Old San Antonio, to the present, when Fiesta goers dream up their own extravagant headwear—the glitzier the better, and as exhibit curator Amy Fulkerson puts it, “Anything goes!”

As Fiesta’s second longest-running royal, King Antonio leads the blue-uniformed Texas Cavaliers in his cape and gold-trimmed, redplumed hat. An early King Antonio started Fiesta’s famous medal-giving tradition, which immediately went viral. This year the Cavaliers alone will distribute about 40,000 decorative

Clockwise from left: Ruby, El Rey Fido 2015; King Antonio and Rey Feo 2015; King Antonio Bart Simpson 2022; El Rey Fido Royal Court 2016

click on this:

CORNYATION

www.Facebook.com/cornyation

FIESTA SAN ANTONIO

www.FiestaSanAntonio.org

REY FEO

www.ReyFeoConsejo.org

SAN ANTONIO CHARROS ASSOCIATION

www.Facebook.com/sacharros

SAN ANTONIO HUMANE SOCIETY

www.SAHumane.org

TEXAS CAVALIERS

www.TexasCavaliers.org

WITTE MUSEUM

www.WitteMuseum.org medals to the Fiesta crowd. The Cavaliers, an exclusive fraternity since 1916, put on the popular Texas Cavaliers River Parade and a citywide children’s art contest with generous prizes— and this year a special VIA bus-wrap featuring winning artwork. The Cavaliers march and ride horseback in the Battle of Flowers Parade, visit more than 100 schools, hospitals and charities, and raise lots of money for good causes—$2 million in 1922, and more than $12 million since 1989. “We decided a long time ago that if we are going to walk around town in our bright blue uniforms and give out medals, to be truly royal we should also be generous,” said this year’s King Antonio, Bart Simpson. “The giving is more important than the pageantry.”

The pageantry is pretty cool, though—witness the other main Fiesta king, Rey Feo. He and his Fiesta court, decked out in glam gold and white uniforms, make hundreds of Fiesta appearances and do good things. Over the years, the Rey Feo Scholarship Fund, the educational project of LULAC Council #2, has given away more than $7 million in scholarships to area students.

These generous rulers are just the tip of the regal iceberg—Fiesta has nine official royals. You will know them by their crowns and sashes and festive ceremonies and events. Miss Fiesta San Antonio has represented the Fiesta San Antonio Foundation’s charitable, cultural and education programs since 1949 with positive messages. The Reina de la Feria de Las Flores also represents the Rey Feo Scholarship Fund. The San Antonio Charro Association’s Charro Queen represents a great Mexican tradition on horsemanship, best experienced at the Fiesta Charreada—a colorful Mexican-style rodeo that is one of the most popular Fiesta events. The Queen of Soul, the Woman’s Club of San Antonio’s Teenage Queen and Miss San Antonio, round out the official slate of royals, but there are countless unofficial ones—there is even a Rey Fido, representing the San Antonio Humane Society. Most famous of the unofficials is the Cornyation—a wild and wacky no-holds-barred spoof of the Coronation put on by the city’s coolest arts and theatre crowd in the ornate Empire Theatre. You will encounter many more in a single day of Fiesta. And in this Fiesta-crazy city, feel free to make up your own kingdom—slap on a crown or a tiara and join the fun!

WRITER’S BIO

Susan Yerkes is an award-winning journalist and travel writer based in San Antonio. She knows royalty—she once ruled the River Walk as Mud Queen II.