Celebrate Tucson women and community at this Tucson pop-up market

To recognize March as Women's History — er HERstory — Month, Selina Barajas wanted to bring Tucson ladies into community.

So on Sunday, March 25, she and a handful of other women-owned small businesses will gather for the Herstory Pop-Up at the House of Neighborly Service, 243 W. 33rd St.

This is what Barajas, a fourth-generation Tucsonan, loves to do: Bring people together.

Barajas runs Mi Reina Mobile Boutique, where she sells women's clothing and accessories out of a 1961 Siesta Liner trailer restored by her father. He also restored an aqua 1957 Chevy truck to tow the trailer.

"Rather than setting up my mobile boutique alone, I wanted to collaborate with other women, primarily small-business owners, and promote empowerment and inspire one another," Barajas, 33, says.

For this pop-up, she partnered with the YWCA's Microbusiness Advancement Center.

"When we started talking about what she is doing, it just fit in complete alignment for the vision of restoring spaces and reinvigorating them, and that's what we have been doing in South Tucson," says Marisol Flores-Aguirre, the executive director of the center.

Last May, Mi Reina Mobile Boutique and the Microbusiness Advancement Center partnered to put on a similar event in honor of motherhood.

Other participating vendors this Sunday include Damsel in Defense, Calle Coffee, Let's Talk Tacos and Local Organic Crops and Stuff Cooperative (LOCAS). Go here for a complete list.

In addition to local shopping and yummy food, the pop-up promises a celebration of the stories of the mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters and mentors that hold influence in our lives.

"All of our small businesses started with a story," says Barajas, who started her business in November 2016. "Ours started with the story that my nana used to call me 'mi reina' or my queen."

Those words gave her confidence and a sense of inner beauty that followed her into adulthood. Through her shop and community gathering, Barajas wants to inspire women in the same way.

Shoppers gather at Mi Reina Mobile Boutique's last pop-up event at the House of Neighborly Services.
Photo by Rescophotography, courtesy of Selina Barajas

"What we like to do is go into areas using the mobile boutique that haven't historically had a lot of community building projects ... and revitalize it that way and build community," she adds.

That's why has has focused many of her pop-events on the south side — the area of town where her grandmother grew up. Many of the vendors at Sunday's event also have roots there.

Part of her intent with the mobile boutique is to bring business to areas that don't have similar offerings. She remembers growing up on the southeast-side of town, where a trip to the mall took all day.

Barajas now lives with her husband and two young daughters in Los Angeles, where she earned a master's degree in urban planning from UCLA and met her husband. She currently works for Inglewood's parks and recreation department and plans citywide events. She makes it back to Tucson every few months to organize Mi Reina pop-up events like the one on Sunday.

"My hope is that this can grow into something bigger, to maybe do spoken word and have musicians," she says. "This is supporting the local economy and having women talk to each other and meet each other and build community that way."

For now, Barajas doesn't plan on taking Mi Reina outside of Tucson too often. Tucson has her heart.

"This is a woman-focused and woman-driven event..." Flores-Aguirre says. "We started to look at this as, 'What a cool way to build community and also talk about economic development. A lot of times, these local mom-and-pop businesses are a driving force in the community, and so often they're overlooked as small fish. So for us, there is so much value and beauty in bringing folks together because they are making Tucson such a vibrant and beautiful place. And we want to recognize that."