Where the street names come from. The most repeated explanation is the Circo Teatro Orín, the touring circus that was a sensation in Porfirian society thanks to the English clown Richard Bell. Every six months it toured the provinces, and it was in Orizaba, Zacatecas, Tuxpan and Medellín that it was received best — so the streets of the new neighbourhood were named after them. It is a rumour rather than a documented fact, but it has outlasted every rival version.
Before it was the Roma. The area was called Romita, and around 1900 it was pasture and shacks on the far edge of the city, lived in mostly by labourers. The barrio of Romita still exists, swallowed inside the grid, and is the oldest thing in the neighbourhood.
How the Roma was built. From 1903, when the politician Pedro Lascuráin bought up the land and commissioned a subdivision far from the crowding of the historic centre. It was built to the most advanced standards of its day: paved streets, dual-carriageway avenues, public lighting, and ironwork fitted to every property by the Casa Gabelich, a specialist firm based in the Doctores.
The first landmark. The Templo de la Sagrada Familia, a neo-gothic church of 1906, built with no expense spared and with its stained glass brought from Italy. The same ironworkers made its monumental railings. Inside it keeps a collection of sacred paintings by an anonymous Jesuit. Walking in costs nothing and takes five minutes.
What to look at now. The Fuente de Cibeles, Plaza Río de Janeiro with its Casa de las Brujas, Plaza Luis Cabrera, and Avenida Álvaro Obregón end to end. The pleasure of the Roma is that it is walked slowly, looking up.
Practical notes. Metro Insurgentes, Sevilla and Hospital General ring the neighbourhood; Metrobús line 1 runs along its western edge. Everything inside is on foot.
All day
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