San Gabriel Popocatla

San Gabriel Popocatla is a locality in the municipality of Ixtacuixtla de Mariano Matamoros, in western Tlaxcala, at about 2,240 m above sea level. The name is Nahuatl and Spanish Wikipedia translates it as "place where smoke abounds"; its patron is the archangel Saint Gabriel. It has grown quickly: the census recorded 127 inhabitants in 1940, 872 in 1990 and 1,505 in 2020. The auxiliary town hall is a red-brick building with arches.

Its reputation rests on cartonería, papier-mâché work. In the workshop of Polo Díaz and his brothers, who learned the trade from their father starting with piñatas, they build monumental catrinas of nearly 4 metres: the frame is reed and wire, covered with recycled paper stuck on with paste, then painted and decorated by hand. Each one takes weeks and preparation starts in August; a November 2025 report says their figures have travelled to Monterrey, Tijuana, Puebla and Cancún. They also make alebrijes, piñatas, a cardboard gorilla and even a chapel with Catholic images. With digitisation, newspaper is getting scarce and local schools and offices hand over their waste paper.

The best time to see the work is late October to early November, when the Day of the Dead catrinas sell. The municipal seat, Villa Mariano Matamoros, has 6,946 inhabitants and holds the history of the convent of San Felipe Ixtacuixtla, requested in 1554 and largely finished around 1585.