Mexico City’s New Textile Museum Puts Indigenous Heritage at the Center
A 19th-century palace near the Templo Mayor archaeological site has become the setting for one of Mexico City’s most ambitious new cultural institutions. The Museo de Arte Textil de los Pueblos Indígenas y Afromexicanos (MUT), which opened earlier this month, presents textiles as a living practice shaped by Indigenous knowledge, regional technique, and historical memory.
The museum occupies a neoclassical building designed by Manuel Tolsá between 1795 and 1805 for the nobleman and mining magnate Francisco Manuel Cayetano de Fagoaga y Arozqueta. The site itself carries layered histories: after the building stood vacant from 2019, Aztec remains already visible there were folded into the museum’s architecture, and more vestiges uncovered in the early 1900s still appear in the structure. Adriana Sanromán, conservator of the Templo Mayor project, notes that the courtyard staircase dates to Templo Mayor’s sixth construction phase.
The 80m-peso project, about $4.6 million, is managed by the Fondo Nacional para el Fomento de las Artesanías, or Fonart, which is overseeing a museum for the first time. Its opening also aligns with the 2026 Fifa World Cup cultural program, though access was complicated by roadblocks linked to teacher protests that disrupted nearby museums.
Inside, 16 galleries present 210 textiles, including four re-creations of historic pieces or works preserved in foreign collections. Curator Alejandro de Ávila says the museum’s commissions reconstruct archaeological designs and lost techniques, while also correcting a long-standing imbalance: textiles, he argues, are an art form largely created by women and historically overlooked.
The displays move from backstrap looms, used across Mexico, to floor looms practiced mainly in the northeast. One highlight is a re-creation of a thousand-year-old pall from Hidalgo, reconstructed by textile artist Jaziel de Jesús after months of research. Other sections examine grana, the cochineal-derived red dye, henequen fiber from Yucatán, and the plants used to produce natural colorants, creating a multisensory account of craft and ecology.
The museum gives strong attention to Oaxaca, but it also insists that every Mexican state has a textile tradition. At the same time, its name gestures toward Afro-Mexican heritage more broadly than the galleries currently deliver. De Ávila acknowledges that Afro-Mexican communities are less represented, though cotton weaving and beadwork are included.
A new workshop, Taller Original, is intended to encourage ethical collaboration between artisans and designers, while temporary exhibitions are planned, including one by Trine Ellitsgaard. The museum ultimately extends the heritage agenda associated with Andrés Manuel López Obrador, linking restitution, conservation, and living craft in a single institution.
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