Spratling was a New York architect who settled in Taxco in 1929. He decided to make pre-Hispanic designs in the silver of the region and trained local artisans in his methods. He collected many beautiful pieces of pre-Hispanic art as well as copies, founding a great museum to house them.

Located in the craft market on the island of Cuale. The museum displays a varied collection of loan items from the regional museums of Guadalajara, Colima and Michoacán, showing the traditions of the ethnic groups inhabiting the west of Mexico: the Chupicuaro, Tarascans and other cultures prior to the Spanish conquest.

This Interpretation Gallery, dedicated to a well-known Mexican archeologist and restorer, is a great place to visit before seeing the Tula Giants. There are some exceptional pieces: a fragment of a pilaster with images of Tlaloc, the kind god and Tezcaltipoca, the fateful one; a unique jaguar in a single piece and the mysterious chacmools.

The site is home to a museum of local history displaying objects belonging to the five different periods of occupation recovered in the course of archeological explorations and presented with careful interpretation. The site was an indigenous ranch and home to the Dominican Mission of Our Lady of Guadalupe of the North, a residence for Russian families and a military barracks. The excavations uncovered foundations and the remains of a small construction beside what are believed to be the original walls.

In the former town hall of Santiago Tuxtla, the place Hernán Cortés chose to establish his marquisate, where he set up the continent’s first wine press. The museum has rich archeological displays of Olmec, Totonac and Mexica cultures, as well as revealing pieces from the viceregal period.1975

An important religious and mission complex in Baja California, it is one of eighteen established by the Mexican Province of the Company of Jesus, to teach, evangelize and protect the ethnic groups in the region from sins. This lasted until all Jesuits were expelled from the Spanish empire in 1767 on the order of Charles III. Its collection focuses on the missionaries and their pupils.

The history of the Valley of Córdoba from the fifth century BC to the viceregal period. Highlights include an important statue of Tonatiuh and an interesting musical instrument collection. It also tells the story of the slave trade and the rebellion led by Gaspar Yanga, the undefeated leader who succeeded in founding the continent’s first settlement free from slavery in 1570.

The local museum in Compostela, the second capital of New Galicia, is now in an eighteenth century house. It has a valuable pre-Hispanic collection of the shaft tomb and Aztatlan cultures. Many objects tell the later story of the city and the surrounding district.

Founded in the 1950s by the city’s artists, one of whom was Juan José Arreola, the museum exhibits pieces from western cultures such as the Cora, Huichol, coastal Nahua and Purepecha, with pieces from the viceregal period and a collection of sketches by the painter José Clemente Orozco.

The Augustinian order’s fifth monastery in Michoacan, was built very much like a fortress in 1550. It was a center for evangelizing the Tarascans and for training priests for this work. This great building was notable for the great masters and pupils who lived and worked here. Restored to its grandeur, it houses exhibitions on the art of printing.