It took just one lap around the event billed as “America’s biggest quince expo” for me to question whether I had ever really known what a quinceañera was.
When I arrived at Houston’s NRG Arena on an August Sunday, I could hear the faint sound of Latin pop trickling out of the building and into the parking lot. Inside, I made my way through pink-and-white floral archways and was met with the booming voice of expo emcee DJ Hershey welcoming a teenage dance crew, High Class Productions, to a faraway stage on the other side of the hall. Beckoned like a sailor to a siren, I followed his voice.
To my right, excited teenage girls and their parents were standing in front of sequined backdrops, testing out a rotating 360-degree photo booth; to my left, groups of them were scoping out the interior of a party bus; and up ahead, they were seated in front of bright vanity lights, getting styled by professional hair and makeup artists. There was the standard fare, too: photographers advertising glossy portraits and memory books, cake makers offering samples of strawberry cheesecake and chocolate mousse, and event hall representatives with displays of their formal tablescapes.
The closer I got to the stage, the livelier the expo became. As I walked over to a row of young girls modeling glimmering custom ball gowns, I found my path blocked by a procession of ten-foot-tall stilt walkers covered in LED lights. They were trailed by hype men who were wearing “big-head” masks of Bad Bunny, Karol G, Peso Pluma, and, for reasons still unknown to me, the titular character from Jim Carrey’s The Mask, a film twice as old as any of this year’s celebrants.
Bombarded by flashing lights, dancing teenagers, and giant sequined dresses everywhere I turned, I was simultaneously mystified and unsurprised. Is a quinceañera supposed to be a thoughtful, beautiful celebration commemorating a young girl’s ascendance to a new stage of life? Yes. But why shouldn’t that include having “robots” on stilts dance with your grandparents? Or hiring a team of dancers to perform a Las Vegas–worthy Beyoncé medley for your family and friends? Young Latinas are multifaceted, complex people, and they would like to put on a show! And some of their parents are even happy to pay five figures for it!
After several hours at the 15 Expo, here’s what I gathered about the latest trends in the wild world of quinces.
The Same Traditions, Just Bigger and Better
There have been a lot of changes in this coming-of-age ceremony, but don’t let the flashing LED dance floor lights blind you: many quinces continue to hold on to the celebration’s core traditions.
There is still a father-daughter dance; a coronation ceremony; the “changing of the shoes,” in which the birthday girl goes from flats to her “first” pair of high heels; symbolic gifts, such as the “last” doll of childhood; and a “court of honor,” made up of boys (chambelanes) and girls (damas) who often perform a dance with the birthday girl. What’s changed is the sheer spectacle of the event.
“For any young Latina, this is a once-in-a-lifetime moment,” says the expo’s founder, Raul Juarez. “People compare it to a wedding, but marriages don’t always last. I think that’s one of the reasons why it continues to hold strong as a tradition. I love seeing that, because there was a time when I wondered whether second-, third-, or fourth-generation Latinos would start to lose it. Instead, it’s the total opposite—it just keeps growing like crazy.”
Juarez grew up in the industry, with both of his parents working as professional event photographers in the Houston area. Since launching the first 15 Expo, in 2001, he’s watched quinces go from humble family gatherings with modest budgets to massive events that can easily cost more than $25,000.
“Everything is just bigger and better,” he says. “What used to be a Lincoln limousine is now a party bus. A dress that used to cost four hundred dollars is now four thousand. Back in the eighties and nineties, you would take the court to get dance lessons for a few hundred dollars, and now it can go up to six thousand for a professional dance crew that’s good enough to perform with JLo. Every year, girls come to our show not to find the same old things, but to find something innovative that will help them outdo their friends.”
His own daughter’s quinceañera took three years to plan and included a live band, a party bus, three different dresses, a Cirque du Soleil theme, a choreographed routine from High Class Productions, and an entryway lined with professional portraits of the birthday girl taken in Dubai. Still, that somehow wasn’t enough to beat the most extravagant quince he’s seen: “There was a quinceañera who was carried in by her chambelanes on an Egyptian [palanquin], escorted by two tigers,” he says. “I still have no idea how they pulled that off.”
Pink Is Out. Red, Purple, and Gold Are In.
Today’s fifteen-year-olds have shown no signs of abandoning the big, poofy ball gown that has long ruled quinceañeras. But they are starting to ditch the usual pink or white color scheme for bolder and brighter options.
“They’re looking to make a statement,” says Miss Unique designer Abraham Navarro. His dresses were among the most showstopping at the expo, featuring massive tulle petticoats, floral designs, and sequined bodices in fuchsia, forest green, and royal blue. His most popular dress is black, with a tiered ruffle skirt that’s accented with yellow roses—a design inspired by the iconic Mexican singer Jenni Rivera.
“When the girls come to me looking for a dress, they want more of everything: more flowers, more colors, more gems,” he says. “The more accents it has, the better. They just want that extraness.”
Makeup artist Andrea Zacarias says that trend has carried over to the overall look. Most of her clients arrive with a photo of their dress, asking for a bold cut-crease eyeshadow that complements the colors.
“They want something full-coverage and extravagant,” she says. “Even their hair is more poofed up, and they’re using a lot of extensions. They just want to see that drastic transformation from their everyday look.”
No More Amateur Dancers.
For years, it was a time-honored tradition to have your close friends and family members potentially embarrass themselves for you by being part of your quince court. You would wear coordinated outfits and spend weeks or months practicing a routine together to perform at the quince. Now no part of the celebration can drag, especially not the dancing. Which is why the expo’s main attraction was undoubtedly the “professional” chambelanes.
Every ten minutes or so, a new highly trained group of teens would grace the stage with a high-energy routine, the dancers wearing coordinated outfits that ranged from white, sequined jumpsuits to more-casual cowboy hats and jeans. High Class Productions brought down the house with a number that included an elevating dance platform, colorful flags, and feathered fans and began with a mash-up of Beyoncé’s “Drunk in Love” and Gloria Trevi’s “Todos Me Miran.”
Johnny Hernandez, one of the High Class choreographers, says that nowadays, “everything is about the show.” With seven to eight events each weekend, the group stays busy throughout the year, and it has been hired to perform at quinceañeras across the state and as far away as Los Angeles. Depending on what the birthday girl has in mind, the dancers perform to different styles, from contemporary pop to music that leans more Mexican or Western.
One of the group’s top-tier packages, the “High Class Queen,” starts at $4,800 and includes six dancers, a surprise custom dance outfit for the quinceañera, props, and a master of ceremonies for the party. Rehearsals begin three months before the event.
“Every quince is different,” Hernandez says. “We never repeat a routine, so we have to build a new show for every single girl. It’s all about putting on a big show. People go to a quince wondering what they’re going to dance to.”
Securing the “It” Factor
In recent years, it’s become increasingly popular for quinces to incorporate la hora loca—a “crazy hour” that announces the end of the formal ceremony and gets guests excited to get out on the dance floor. This is when everything from the party favors to the entertainment can really go wild, taking the quince from a birthday party to a full-on carnival.
Esmeralda Armendariz of Esmy’s Events has been planning quinceañeras for fifteen years under the slogan, “Whatever you can dream, we can create.” In that time, that’s meant catering to every new trend and keeping up with the ever-changing demands of her fifteen-year-old clients. She’s rolled out red carpets, set up rotating photo booths, secured dancers, and delivered on the latest craze: specialized food carts.
“Everyone wants a cart now, so I do them all,” she says. “I offer an elote cart, a Maruchan snack cart, chilaquiles cart, popsicle carts, and candy carts. People used to have fruit displays or tables set with food; now it’s all about the carts.”
In keeping with the carnival atmosphere, quinces have started to include performers dressed as robots. Esbeide Jaimes of Houston Robot Show first saw the stilt walkers at a party in Mexico and decided to bring the idea back home to Texas. Today her business offers robots in every color. “The best robots come from Guadalajara,” she says.
For $1,400, families can get multiple robots, smoke guns, foam sticks, light-up glasses, and several “big heads,” the most popular of which are currently Peso Pluma, Bad Bunny, and Karol G. “Two or three years ago, it was Daddy Yankee and Pitbull, but we also have a Celia Cruz that hasn’t been used in years,” Jaimes says.
When she launched the business several years ago, the performers were going to a handful of quinces every month. Now, she says, Houston Robot Show might do six or seven quinces in a week. Looking around, she says the events are almost unrecognizable compared to her own quince. “The girls are so much more outgoing now,” she says. “It’s not like when me and my sister were younger, and we were too shy to dance. These girls are ready for the cameras.”
