Bellavista

Bellavista lies north of Tepic, about ten minutes from the historic centre, and it exists because of its factory. The cotton spinning and weaving mill went up in 1841 as a replica of the Bellevue works in Ghent, Belgium, which gave it its name. It was founded by Eustaquio Barrón and Guillermo Forbes and came to employ more than 350 workers. Around it grew the workers' housing, the company store (tienda de raya) where wages were paid in vouchers, and a system of dams, channels and water tanks that harnessed the Tepic River to drive the machinery. Some stretches of the aqueduct still carry irrigation water to the fields.

The village holds its own place in Mexican labour history: one of the country's first work stoppages by women took place here in the 19th century, and in March 1905 the first workers' strike of the 20th century. The neoclassical Salón de Actos of 1872, also called the Masonic Temple for the eye of providence on its front, keeps on its south wall a mural by Rosendo Soto (1912-1994) about those labour struggles. It is one of the few works of Mexican muralism in the country's northwest, and its roofs need conservation work.

The old mill is now a cultural centre with a collection of tools, materials, documents and photographs of the textile industry and tours of the original machinery, plus an arts school with classes in theatre, singing, music, dance, ceramics and visual arts. INAH's Nayarit office has surveyed the mill, the workers' housing, the company store and the water system to seek a federal declaration of Bellavista as a Historic Monuments Zone.

Mexico's federal Tourism Secretariat (SECTUR) named Bellavista a Barrio Mágico in June 2024, at the Tianguis Internacional de Pueblos Mágicos held in San Antonio, Texas. The village sits at 785 metres and keeps its cobbled streets.