Lake Cajititlán lies 25 kilometers south of Guadalajara and 15 kilometers north of Lake Chapala. Sprinkled along its shore are small communities of very talented artisans.
After visiting several of them, I came to the largest town around the lake, itself named Cajititlán. I knew of no dominant craft there and suspected that its “specialty” must be its big tianguis (market), where the crafts of all the other communities were sold every week.
“Doesn’t Cajititlán produce a handicraft all its own?” I asked a local man.
“No, no,” he said. “Except for Consuelo. She makes nice things out of crin and cerda.”
Crin, I learned, refers to a horse’s mane, while cerda is used for the beautiful long hair of its tail. Naturally I was curious to see what an artistic person could make out of these.
It was 2012 and my wife Susy and I found Consuelo Cervantes working on her craft at home. Upon discovering how curious we were about what she was doing, she began to show us all kinds of beautiful and ingenious handicrafts. From the mane she would make key fobs and tassels and from the tail, elegant belts that any charro would be proud to show off.
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