page_title: San Miguel de Allende
section_title: Culture
hierarchical_section_title: San Miguel de Allende / Culture
caption_attribution_description: English: Entrance to a crafts store with rug and mirrors on display. In San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, Mexico
context_page_description: San Miguel de Allende is the principal city in the municipality of San Miguel de Allende, located in the far eastern part of Guanajuato, Mexico. A part of the Bajío region, the city lies 274 km from Mexico City, 86 km from Querétaro, and 97 km from the state capital of Guanajuato. The city's name derives from two persons: 16th-century friar Juan de San Miguel, and a martyr of Mexican Independence, Ignacio Allende, who was born in a house facing the city's central plaza. San Miguel de Allende was also a critical epicenter during the historic Chichimeca War where the Chichimeca Confederation defeated the Spanish Empire in the initial colonization war. Today, an old section of the town is part of a proclaimed World Heritage Site, attracting thousands of tourists and new residents from abroad every year.
  At the beginning of the 20th century, the town was in danger of becoming a ghost town after an influenza pandemic. Gradually, its Baroque/Neoclassical colonial structures were "discovered" by foreign artists who moved in and began art and cultural institutes such as the Instituto Allende and the Escuela de Bellas Artes.
caption: Entrance to a crafts store in the historic center of the town
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