Merida’s Spell Is Woven Into Fabric of Its Society

This city, the largest on the Yucatan Peninsula, is a Mecca for local handcrafts that reflect the city’s unusual history and life style.

An exceptionally pretty and friendly place filled with charming public squares, ancient churches, colonial mansions and monuments, Merida is near Mexico’s Gulf coast and not far from Chichen Itza, Uxmal and other major archeological sites.

Shoppers can buy traditional clothing, hats, handbags and baskets woven of hennequen or palm, ceramic and papier-mache items, reproductions of Mayan artifacts and Yucatecan hammocks.

Both pretty and practical, huipils and guayaberas are still fashionable. They’re sold in shops lining Merida’s clean gridlike avenues, and by street vendors who station themselves outside hotels and at tourist sites.

Unfortunately, synthetic fabrics and machine embroidery are most common these days. Pure cotton and hand-embroidered garments are increasingly difficult to find, and they cost more. But as even the finest quality garments are reasonably priced, it’s worth the effort to find them. Here are some reliable sources:

Hand-Embroidered

The boutique at the Hotel Casa Del Balam (Calle 60, No. 488) usually has about a dozen hand-embroidered huipils in stock.

Colors of the embroidered flowers and butterflies that border the necks, sleeves and hems are vibrant but not as gaudy as they sometimes seem on machine-embroidered garments.

Prices begin at about $150 U.S., but the superb workmanship is worth every cent. The shop also sells some unusual hand-woven cotton handbags ($30) as well as rebozos ($20 and up) of wool or silk and unusual dolls ($15 and up).

For the finest quality guayaberas , shop at Jack (Calle 59, No. 505) and/or Camiseria Canul (Calle 59, No. 496B), where you can get made-to-order shirts for about $45 and up.

The shirts are 100% cotton and may be ordered in white or one of several pastels. Shirts can be made in several days. They can be shipped to your home, but it’s safer to take them with you. Ready-to-wear guayaberas of 100% cotton cost about $18 and up.

The Agora Fonapas Crafts Center (Calle 63, No. 503, between Calles 64 and 66) is a government-sponsored shop with wonderful huipils for about $45 and up. Many are 100% cotton but few are hand-embroidered.

However, the machine-worked patterns, similar in motif to those that are traditionally hand-embroidered, are done well. If you can’t find hand-embroidered garments, these are the next-best.

The shop also has a wide selection of ready-to-wear 100% cotton guayaberas (about $25 and up) as well as baskets (about $10 and up), hand-tooled leather bags (about $30 and up), ceramics, reproductions of Mayan figurines ($5 and up), lots of toys and attractive, comfortable leather sandals ($8 and up) with soles made of pieces of old tires.

While wandering around Merida (and/or the nearby Mayan ruins or beaches) you’ll want a sun hat. Panama hats are the hats of choice. Much of the world’s supply of them comes from the Yucatan. They only got the name “Panama” because of their popularity during the building of the Panama Canal.

The local name for the hats is jipis because they are made from the pliant fibers of the jipijapa plant. Now, less-expensive palm fibers are sometimes used to make the hats.

Most Panama hats are made in the town of Becal, but you can get high-quality jipis made with jipijapa fiber and with very fine weave in Merida, especially at La Casa de Los Jipis (Calle 56, No. 526, near Calle 65). This shop, with its huge stock of hats displayed in stacks, is a good place to learn the finer points of fine jipis .

Even if you eventually wind up buying a hat off the head of a street vendor (some of whom look like walking hat racks), browse here first to learn about quality and fair price.

Ask to see finos , a high grade of hat with an exceptionally fine weave. You can crush them, roll them up and shove them into your suitcase or handbag, take them out, shake them out and they’re perfect for wearing.

Better hats wear forever, and their style is classic. Priced at about $60 and up, these are pricey, but if you’re serious about hats, you can’t afford to settle for less.

Mayan Hammocks

Medium-priced jipis (about $30 and up at La Casa de Los Jipis and other shops) have a coarser weave and are less durable, but are acceptable alternatives to the finos .

Don’t bother with cheap hats (about $15 or less). Found in the Mercado and all tourist shops or on the heads of street vendors, they have a very coarse weave and will probably fall apart quickly, perhaps even before you leave for home.

Hammocks (or hamacas ), made and sold throughout the Yucatan, are among Merida’s best buys. These traditional Mayan hanging beds are hand-woven and knotted of cotton, silk or nylon string, with one or many bright colors, and are made in various lengths and widths.

Carefully check the fiber, workmanship, length and width before you buy your hammock. Here are some guidelines:

Silk is the most expensive fiber and nylon the most durable, but most people buy cotton because it’s attractive, inexpensive and it’s a natural fiber.

The hammock strings should be tightly woven, tightly knotted and not fraying, especially where the woven strings are attached to the end loops. There should be no irregularities.

Measure the Length

As for length, the hammock’s body should be a little bit longer than yours, otherwise it will be uncomfortable. The Maya tend to be short, and so do the hammocks.

To check length, hold one end of the body of the hammock level with the top of your head and let the hammock fall to your feet. If the other end of the body of the hammock isn’t lying on the floor, the hammock is too short.

You often may lie in a hammock on the diagonal, so width--determined by number of strings--is important. Singles ( sencilos ) have 50 pairs of end strings, doubles ( dobles ) have 100 pairs, matrimonials have 150 pairs and special matrimonials ( matrimonials especiales or hamacas de quatro cajas ) have at least 175 pairs of end strings.

A person of average height and girth can do with a double, but wider hammocks are more comfortable. Buy the widest hammock you can afford.

You can get reasonable hammocks from street vendors, if you won’t feel awkward standing outside your hotel square measuring length, counting strings and inspecting weave.

The best hammock shop in town is La Poblana (Calle 65, No. 492, between Calles 60 and 62), with two floors filled with hammocks of all fibers, colors, lengths, widths and price categories.

The staff patiently helps you make your choice. Prices, ranging from about $25 and up, are clearly marked and fair. This is not the place to bargain.

Or look for hammocks, huipils, guayaberas , hats and a wide range of curios in Merida’s bustling and huge Mercado (an area bounded by Calles 63 to 69 and 62 to 64), where hundreds of stalls sell handcrafts, foodstuffs, household supplies and gadgets.

The profusion of goods can be confusing, especially with hammocks and Panama hats that, at first glance, look alike. It’s a good idea to visit the specialty shops before trying to bargain through the Mercado.

Merida addresses are easy to find because all streets are numbered, with even-numbered streets running north-south and odd-numbered streets running east-west.

Prices quoted in this article reflect currency exchange rates at the time of writing .