Making their debut post-World War II within the Mexican American community, lowriders hit the U.S. Southwest, Texas, and California boulevards low and slow, sporting lowered suspensions and distinct customizations. Unlike the highly sought-after hot rods at the time, lowriders were specifically made for cruising—to show off their elaborate metallic bodies with eye-catching “candy” paint and hopping hydraulics. They reflected the mechanical expertise of their makers—some of them applying skills and materials from their war industry jobs. They embodied creativity, and later in the 1960s, they became an icon of Chicano culture and pride.

The heart of lowriding is its expression of community, resilience, and family. And lowrider culture encompasses not simply cars, but also music and artwork and intergenerational relationships. The activities and people we will be featuring at the 2025 Smithsonian Folklife Festival extend this storied history into the present and future—zeroing in on high school students and intergenerational mentorship, transnational collaborations and the involvement of women and girls.

While their presence was once minimized, represented primarily as models or accessories, women are now spotlighted as the owners, customizers, and operators of these adorned vehicles. Women lowriders are voicing their stories and experiences proud and clear. In 2024, the California Automobile Museum in Sacramento opened Rucas y Carruchas: Ladies in Lowriders—an exhibition that celebrates the contributions of women in the lowrider community. For Women’s History Month 2025, Lowrider Magazine released a limited edition that was written, edited, directed, and photographed by and for women.

As the curatorial assistant for the lowrider programming at the Festival, I delved into the expansive world of lowriding through some research of my own. As a starting point, I used the work of Dr. Denise M. Sandoval—a professor of Chicana and Chicano studies at California State University, Northridge, and a prominent scholar of lowrider culture. I created a crash-course for myself—from Duke’s Car Club, the oldest lowrider car club in the world, to the issuing and repeal of anti-cruising ordinances.

I was especially interested to explore the importance of passing la cultura to the next generation through the perspectives of female lowriders, and I was drawn to Nayeli Rodriguez—a high school student at Sacramento Academic and Vocational Academy (SAVA). She is part of a team working on converting a 1964 Chevy Impala into a fully electric lowrider, which is featured in the 2025 Festival. With a passion for old-school lowrider music, Nayeli was recently invited to be the youth ambassador for a soul and funk event and is now learning to spin vinyl from a local female DJ.

She’s also the daughter of ShaVolla Rodriguez—curator at the California Automobile Museum who spearheaded the Rucas y Carruchas exhibition and first introduced the lowrider conversion project idea to SAVA. A lifelong lowrider herself, ShaVolla graciously accepted my request to interview her and Nayeli to learn more about intricacies of their mother-daughter lowrider legacy. Nayeli also curated a lowrider oldies, soul, and funk playlist for me to listen to in preparation for our conversation. You can listen here too!

ShaVolla and Nayeli Rodriguez will join SAVA in the Streetwise tent at the 2025 Smithsonian Folklife Festival, part of the program Youth and the Future of Culture. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What is lowriding and why is it significant to you?

ShaVolla: For me, lowriding is a cultural thing. It was a bonding thing for my dad and me. There are so many pieces to lowriding because it’s not just about the cars. It’s a whole culture of music, traditions, cars, artwork—all these things that are blended into one thing. It’s a community.

Nayeli: I don’t know how I could have explained that better. But I think the biggest thing about lowriding is definitely the family part of it and how everyone takes care of each other, whether you’re blood related or not, and being there for each other no matter what—always showing up.

We were just talking about how nostalgic the scent of exhaust is when we’re starting up the cars. That’s one of my favorite parts.

How do you think the view of lowriders has changed in the past few years?

ShaVolla: It was not super looked down upon when I started going to car shows with my dad when I was younger. It always felt family orientated because I was with my dad and we’d meet up with my uncles and family friends. But I think around the ’80s or so there were a lot of negative views around lowriding because there was an increase in gang activity and things like that happening that gave lowriding a bad name. As time went on, people continued to associate that with the lowriding community. It didn’t help that Hollywood created this narrative that Chicanos or lowriders were always the bad guys.

People that are not in the culture don’t realize what it takes to build these cars—the time, the effort, the money that’s spent putting these cars together—until they talk to someone in the community. It’s been a roller coaster, but now there’s more people speaking out. Now we’re seeing lowriders in museums and on exhibit where we’re accessible to everyone.

This is where these other crowds that don’t know the lowrider community get to meet us. And it’s like, “Oh my God, you guys are so family oriented. I’ve never seen so many kids or so many families or so many women. Everyone is so friendly. They offered us a chair or a plate of food!” I think things like that are building these bridges and breaking some of the barriers.

Nayeli: How they portray us is shifting. It was different back then, but I’m happy to see that a lot of people are taking the chance on our people. Growing up, I always noticed how I would get certain looks outside of car shows because of how I dressed. People would stare or whisper to each other when I walked by. I was even followed around a store when I was twelve years old, which is kind of crazy. And I’ve never stolen a day in my life!

So to see the growth of how people aren’t really treating us that way anymore—I don’t feel insecure about the way that I dress anymore or worry about being followed around and accused of stealing based on my appearance. Now I get compliments from people outside of our culture, and to see that difference and actually experience it is uplifting.

How often do you go cruising together?

ShaVolla: Like every weekend! We literally just went out all weekend long. On Friday, we had a cruise at a new burger joint. The owner reached out and said, “I heard you guys usually do cruise nights at burger places in the summer.” And I said, yeah, I can help you get that going, and we’ll reach out to some other car clubs. So she’s been having them almost every Friday night with different lowrider car clubs. There were a bunch of us in the parking lot. We got a DJ. Everyone was dancing, laughing, and having a good time.

Nayeli: We went out cruising for Mother’s Day too! Actually, that was a very fulfilling day. We went to an antique fair. We stopped by to see some of our people that we go cruising with and came home with a big plate of food. Then we sat in the living room for about two or three hours. We were just there listening to records that we all bought. After that we went outside, wiped down the car, got it started up, went for a cruise, got ice cream, and came home.

ShaVolla: It was amazing.

How important are intergenerational relationships to maintaining lowrider culture?

ShaVolla: Honestly, it’s a community of families. So it’s very, very important because you’re teaching your kids at a young age this sense of community where all these people are there for you. Since they were little, I was never afraid of my kids going to car shows and walking around our city, because they knew so many people that were always looking out for them.

My youngest son had a little pedal car that we bought him that matched his dad’s car. I would drive the Suburban to car shows just so he could take the pedal car because I knew he loved it so much. He had his own little Bluetooth speaker. He’d take off for like an hour, hour and a half, and he’d come back with money in his pocket, sodas, chips in the trunk of his car, toys, all kinds of things. We’d be walking around, and people would be like, “Oh, yeah, I just saw Luciano! He was over there.” And mind you, he was like four years old. But everybody knew him, and it was a safe space.

So, I think it’s so important because the kids learn this sense of community and family. There’s security in that. To this day, I still have his pedal car. So, one day when he’s grown up and he has his kids, they’ll be able to jam around on the pedal car as well. It’s those things that you just continue to pass down.

What does having this shared bond and admiration of lowriding mean to you?

Nayeli: It’s everything to me. I’ve purposely canceled so many plans because I would rather go cruising with my parents than go out with friends. Once I hear that my parents are going cruising, I’m like, “Oh, sorry, can’t make it.” Just like music, it’s like therapy.

Cruising together builds deeper connections. My mom and I are always bouncing ideas off of each other when we cruise. All these different ideas for businesses we want to get into or cool events we want to throw or exhibit ideas—it always stems back to lowriding. It already has so much to offer within our community and even to outsiders. I just love being with my parents and cruising and seeing my extended family within the lowrider community.

ShaVolla: I am grateful for this, these experiences, because it has kept my children close to me. They’re not running off with their friends and doing bad things. It’s like, “Oh, do you want to go to a birthday party or go skating with your friends? We’re going to take the cars out and cruise.” And without question, they always want to cruise with us instead—always. There’s never just my husband and me—we used to have to sneak out for date night! We would try and sneak out super, super quietly, push the car out without starting it in the garage. And as soon as the kids would hear it fire up, they were running out with mismatched shoes on, shorts, and a random sweatshirt—whatever they could throw on—and be like, “We want to go!” They always just wanted to be with us, and I’m so grateful and thankful for that because it’s huge. It’s kept us all close.

Nayeli, thank you for sending the playlist you curated. When you’re out cruising and you get passed the aux, what’s the first song you’re playing?

Nayeli: Right now, my song of the month is “Not on the Outside” by The Moments. I was just telling my mom about it; I just bought myself a 45 record of it that I found for $1. But usually it depends on my mood and the time of day. To me, music is a form of therapy. I’ve never been one to verbally express my feelings, and when I play music I feel like it lets me communicate my thoughts and emotions without having to open my mouth.

Music is a major essential in my family, and it’s something both my grandparents and parents share a love for. Growing up, I listened to all different types of music and developed a special love for many genres. For the playlist I created, I wanted to make sure everyone was included. I added White, Black, Mexican, NorCal, SoCal, female, and male singers. I feel like music has created such a big bond between people of different races and ethnicities and backgrounds. It’s one thing that definitely brings a lot of people together.

Mom—what about you? What’s that one song you’ve been listening to lately?

ShaVolla: Jesse Belvin’s “Good Night, My Love.” That was a song that my dad sang to me every night growing up—every single night. And I found the record at a local store the other day, and I was like, “Oh my God, score!” It was $2, and the guy was like, “Dude, you can have it.” And I thought to myself at that moment that I was literally meant to be right there.

My dad passed away several years ago, and it’s still very hard for me. But I think music creates such a deep connection. I feel like it’s the soundtrack to my life. So little things like that—getting up in the morning and making breakfast with the family and having music playing and singing and dancing—the same things my dad would do with me when I was a kid. To be able to share that with my kids now is amazing. It doesn’t cost anything, but it’s creating everlasting memories. I’ll never forget those times.