Flatiron North Plaza, NYC: Free Día de Muertos Altar and Celebration, Oct 26–Nov 3

The Flatiron NoMad Partnership, the district's business improvement district, is staging its fifth annual Día de Muertos program at Flatiron North Plaza, at 23rd Street and Broadway. Every activation is free and no tickets are needed.

The centerpiece is a community altar called Twenty Petal Flower, designed by Mestiz Studio, which Daniel Valero founded in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, together with Brooklyn's Powerhouse Arts. It was made across two cities, with Mestiz's workshop in San Miguel de Allende and Powerhouse Arts in Brooklyn, before arriving in the plaza. The title comes from the Nahuatl word cempōhualxōchitl, "twenty petal flower," meaning the marigold, or cempasúchil. The piece pays tribute to the agricultural workers who grow and harvest the flower in the fields of Michoacán, to the hands that turn it into garlands and offerings, and to the temporary floral arches, crosses and altars built in Mexican cemeteries each year. In the plaza, oversized woven floral forms are arranged across a tiered altar lit with warm, candle-like light, and visitors are invited to leave remembrances. The altar is on view from October 26 through November 3. Powerhouse Arts' Brittni Collins described the project as an exchange between two workshops, two cities and two ways of making.

The main celebration takes place on Wednesday, October 28, from 3 to 7 p.m. Calpulli Mexican Dance Company presents a mix of Mexican folklore performances, and the New York collective Son Pecadores plays live music. There is La Catrina face painting and skull decorating. Mano a Mano: Mexican Culture Without Borders leads a flower-making workshop, Center for Book Arts hosts a Día de Muertos-inspired booklet-making activity, and Poster House offers DIY printmaking and a paper marigold activity.

Elsewhere in the district, a papel picado installation designed by Tanya Aguiñiga Studio hangs over Flatiron South Plaza, at 23rd Street, Fifth Avenue and Broadway, from October 5 to November 3. Día de Muertos-themed block covers also decorate the North Plaza from October 1 through November 3. The partnership says Flatiron and NoMad are home to many Mexican- and Latinx-owned businesses, from casual restaurants to fine dining and beauty brands, and it publishes a guide to them.

The organizers describe Día de Muertos as a Mexican tradition of pre-Hispanic origin in which, according to popular belief, the souls of the dead return home between October 31 and November 2, welcomed with altars, offerings and food.